Existing comment:
Between the Civil War and the modern civil rights movement, thousands of African Americans were subjected to acts of torture and murder known as lynchings. Racial terrorism was illegal, but in Jim Crow America it was rampant and far too often tolerated or endorsed. Lynching peaked between 1877 and 1950 -- Traylor's adult lifetime. He often drew violent scenes but rarely depicted racial persecution in an overt way. A small number of Traylor's drawings, however, attest to the injustice and inhumanity he had witnessed. |