| Ax Handle Saturday | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Part ofCivil Rights Movement | |||
| Date | August 27, 1960; 65 years ago (August 27, 1960) | ||
| Location | |||
| Parties | |||
| |||
Ax Handle Saturday, also known as theJacksonville riot of 1960, was a racially motivated attack inHemming Park (since renamed James Weldon Johnson Park) inJacksonville, Florida, on August 27, 1960. A group of about 200 white men used baseball bats andax handles to attack black people who were insit-in protests opposingracial segregation.
Because of its high visibility and patronage,Hemming Park and surrounding stores were the site of numerouscivil rights demonstrations in the 1960s. Blacksit-ins began on August 13, 1960, when students asked for service at the segregated lunch counter atW. T. Grant,Woolworths,Morrison's Cafeteria, and other eateries. They were denied service, kicked, spat at, and addressed with racial slurs.[3][4]
On August 27, 1960, a group of approximately 200 white men, some of whom were thought to haveKu Klux Klan affiliations, gathered in Hemming Park armed with baseball bats and ax handles.[5] They attacked the protesters conducting sit-ins. The violence spread, and the white mob started attacking all black people in sight. Rumors were rampant on both sides that the unrest was spreading around the county. Actually, the violence stayed in relatively the same location, and did not spill over into the mostly white, upper-class Cedar Hills neighborhood, for example. A black street gang called the Boomerangs came to protect the demonstrators.[6] Police had not intervened when the protesters were attacked, but when "blacks started holding their own"[7] and the Boomerangs and other black residents attempted to stop the beatings, the police arrested them for it.[8][9]
Nat Glover, who later worked in Jacksonville law enforcement for 37 years, including eight years as sheriff of Jacksonville, recalled stumbling into the riot. Glover said he ran to the police, expecting them to arrest the thugs, but was told to leave town or risk being killed.[10]
Several white people had joined the black protesters on that day. Richard Charles Parker, a 25-year-old student attendingFlorida State University, was among them. White protesters were the object of particular dislike by racists, so when the fracas began, Parker was hustled out of the area for his own protection. The police had been watching him and arrested him as an instigator, charging him with vagrancy, disorderly conduct and inciting a riot. After Parker stated that he was proud to be a member of theNAACP, Judge John Santora sentenced him to 90 days in jail. He was attacked in jail, suffering a broken jaw, after which Santora sentenced him to aroad gang.[11][12][13]
Local authorities and news media downplayed the violence. MayorHaydon Burns claimed there was no violence, and Jacksonville's leading newspaper buried the story on page fifteen. It was covered by local Black publications, out-of-town reporters, and inLife magazine. The mayor alleged most rioters were not Jacksonville residents and refused to convene a committee requested by theNAACP to address racial discrimination.[14][15]
Snyder Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church hosted community discussions and negotiations following the incident.[16] Lunch counters in Jacksonville were desegregated in 1961.[17]
