Mob Hangs Negroes — Duluth News Tribune Front Page, June 16, 1920

Duluth News Tribune, June 16, 1920.

The morning after three Black men were dragged from the Duluth city jail and lynched at a street corner, the local paper ran this front page. The headline fills the frame. The subheads record the rest: police powerless, crowd fired by vengeance, lynchers may be prosecuted.

The three men were Elias Clayton, Elmer Jackson, and Isaac McGhie — circus workers who had been accused, without evidence, of assaulting a white woman. A physician's examination found no evidence of assault. They were pulled from custody anyway, beaten, and hanged before a crowd estimated in the thousands.

Photographs of their bodies were printed as postcards and sold for 50 cents each — as documented in a companion Receipt in this catalog.

Three men were eventually tried for the lynchings. One was convicted of rioting. He served less than three years.

This front page was printed the morning it happened. It is the record as the city saw it on June 16, 1920.

Available in three sizes. Framed or print only.