https://www.startribune.com/new-orleans-protesters-pull-down-bust-throw-it-in-river/571244382/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McDonoghYesterday rioters in New Orleans targeted a bust of John McDonogh, dragged it in the streets and threw it into the Mississippi.
John McDonogh was shipping magnate and real estate tycoon who possessed the largest private land holdings of his time and large slave holdings, notable for developing a scheme of manumission for slaves to buy their own freedom from him. An eccentric miserly man who barely spent any money in life and accumulated a vast fortune, when he died at age 70 he donated almost his entire fortune in his will to public schools for freed black children and poor white children, as well as contributing heavily to charities for freed slaves who wanted to return to africa which in life he used to send many former slaves of to liberia, including several he mentored personally to teach them to read and write (McDonogh personally violating louisiana laws in doing so). Giving away almost his entire holdings at death to poor children / free blacks was so controversial it wound up going to the supreme court as his heirs challenged it. In the end he wound up funding 30+ schools for 100+ years with his fortune. As per his will, he was buried alongside his slaves and freedmen in a black cemetery on his main plantation, with his gravesite being part of an annual ceremony by the black schools to honor his legacy, and the cause of the 1954 McDonogh Day Boycott for black civil rights when the NAACP objected to the schoolchildren taking segregated turns for black and white kids to honor McDonogh separately.
Yesterday rioters in New Orleans targeted a bust of John McDonogh, dragged it in the streets and threw it into the Mississippi.
This post was edited by Goomshill on Jun 14 2020 03:47am