In the so-called Panhandle, where Florida joins south Alabama, there is a city called Marianna.
And for decades there was a horrible reformatory called the Florida School for Boys, just outside the city. Black and white boys were kept there, fully segregated, too often tortured, raped and beaten to death by the sadistic monsters hired as guards.
A separate building called the “White House” was where the ultimate degradations were inflicted on the boys, still carefully separated by race. Victims were buried in unmarked graves, still being discovered recently.
Families who inquired about a missing boy were told that he had escaped from the School for Boys and officials there had no knowledge of where he went. A ground-probing radar system, like one used here at the old Harshaw Chapel Cemetery to locate unmarked graves, explored much of the school grounds and found many burials.
That effort was suspended last fall, citing vast areas of trees and heavy brush, complicated by 2018 hurricane damage and no real evidence of where to look.
Segregated in death, black victims were found in clusters but many observers say a major white burial site is yet to be discovered.
Author wins 2 Pulitizers
New York author Colson Whitehead won a Pulitizer prize two years ago for his The Underground Railroad and came right back and won the Pulitizer again last year for The Nickel Boys.
I bought and read it recently, a novel that is a work of fiction but based on hard truth – two young black boys confined at a Florida reformatory – Whitehead’s inspiration for his book.
Man’s inhuman treatment of the weak is detailed, gut-wrenching suspense as the two boys endure days of terror awaiting a midnight trip to the “White House.”
Some of the inmates survived the nightmare experience and began talking to newspapers. Investigations began. The “White House” was closed, with a memorial plaque on it and the whole school shut down in 2011.
Abused boys, now grown to be men, want to sue the State of Florida for compensation for their days in hell-on-earth. Back in January, a subcommittee of the Legislature gave preliminary approval for the process.
Local linkage
I’m getting old but still have a fair memory, thank God, and we had a grim incident here in the 1970s. I talked to several retired lawmen to write this piece, their recollections about the same as mine.
Blain Stalcup was the popular sheriff in Murphy, ran his department and the county jail out of a three-story red-brick building that was torn down when the courthouse was enlarged.
He had hired a gentle giant from Andrews to be his main jailer, big man with a big heart, cared about all the folks locked up in his jail.
I often visited the dispatcher’s room to see what was going on. Was told that three young white boys were being brought in, caught in a stolen car.
They had escaped from a Florida reform school, deputies said, and were going to be held in our jail here. Officers from their school would come to re-take them, and the boys had been informed.
That night one of them, just 16 years old, hanged himself in his cell.
The jailer was heartbroken and didn’t last long at the job afterward.
I wondered why a young kid like that would kill himself. Now I know.
Wally Avett first wrote for the Cherokee Scout as editor in 1969. His books are available at the Scout. Call him at 837-5531 or email wallyavett@gmail.com.