Atlanta is today one of the Blackest U.S. cities. But in 1912, its neighbor Forsyth County was terrorized by white supremacy. After a Black man allegedly beat a white woman, night-riding racists burned, lynched, and terrorized Black folks out of town.
Their exodus left behind empty homes, churches, and schools. This racial cleansing drove over 1,000 Black people out of Oscarville, Georgia, in just a few short months.
But it gets worse.
They stole Black-owned land! Legal loopholes made it easy for them to acquire the “abandoned” land. And by 1950, it was sold to the US government – which then did the unthinkable.
Today, placed right on the top of a once-thriving Black community is Lake Lanier – a place countless white people spend their weekends boating and fishing!
Some believe that the community’s former residents haunt the lake, as hundreds of drownings have happened over the years. But Oscarville isn’t the only drowned Black town in America.
Many once-Black communities like Kowaliga, Alabama, Seneca Village, New York, and Vanport, Oregon, have disappeared under today’s reservoirs, lakes, and parks.
Nothing can undo the physical damage of these drownings and the lasting generational effects on Black wealth. But we can remember them and demand justice for those lost communities – and for the ones we live in today.