Omaha Gathers Soil to Memorialize 1891 Lynching Victim

Oct. 25, 2020, 9:04 p.m. ·

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Attendees collect soil to preserve from the grounds of the Douglas County Courthouse. (Photo taken from KETV livestream)

A crowd gathered outside the Douglas County Courthouse Friday to commemorate the 1891 lynching of George Smith, a black man, after he was dragged from the courthouse by a racist mob.


The ceremony’s concept was simple. A socially distanced group of Omaha leaders and neighbors filled large jars with soil from the grounds of the courthouse, while speakers read an account of the event from David Bristow's A Dirty, Wicked Town: Tales of 19th Century Omaha.

But Program Director Elliot Spillers of the Alabama-based Equal Justice Initiative, which helped organize the ceremony with several Omaha organizations, says the intention is complex, tying Omaha’s racial past and present together.

“By collecting soil, we seek to connect back with the earth back with the story, the cries of the men we honor today," he said on a cold, windy afternoon.

"You all will have an opportunity to fully and holistically reimagine what Omaha could look like, in a new era of truth and justice.”

He says that means fully understanding how America's racist history — and those complicit in its upkeep — continue to impact communities today.

Author David Bristow said that requires reckoning with how in 2020, racist violence is not always as overt as it was in the 19th century.

"Today, it's usually more subtle ... in 2020, no one admits to dehumanizing others, but people will show you what they believe by what they choose to ignore, and by what they're willing to go along with," he opined. "George Smith was not murdered by an individual but by a mob, and not just by a mob, but by an entire society."

Members of the Douglas County Community Remembrance Project, the Omaha Human Rights and Relations Department, and the Community Council for Racial Justice and Reconciliation also read passages detailing how the city coalesced without evidence around allegations of sexual misconduct by Smith.

Spillers closed the ceremony with an encouragement for more similar events and traditions that would offer the community an opportunity to reflect on its history.

"Through these projects and new projects that we hope to be created by Omaha, we hope that there will be new traditions that honestly create patterns and a practice for how this history can not only be retold, but how it can also ensure that does not happen again."