There was a sundown town sign posted at the intersection of I 10 & Wilson Street in Vidor, Texas. Which was once located in the middle of the town of Vidor. This sign was known as the “Negro Road Sign”. This news article will explain where the sign was located and what happened to the sign.
There was a once a sundown town sign posted in the middle of the town of Vidor at the intersection of I-10 & Wilson Street that read, "Niggers read this and run. If you can't read, run anyway. Nigger, don't let the sun set on you in Vidor." This was one of those signs which meant, “Don’t let the sun set on you here.” The sign basically ordered and warned black people to get out before sundown. (Ref: Texas Monthly, Vidor in Black And White, Mimi Swartz, December 1993, https://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/vidor-in-black-and-white/)
A 1955 news article written by Mary Alice Lake for the Orange Leader newspaper stated that there was a sundown town sign on Wilson Street aka Negro Sign Road for many years. The exact amount of years the sign had been existing within the city limits was unknown. The Orange Leader newspaper stated will Wilson Street had “for years, the road bore a sign.” . (Ref: https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth558951/m1/2/zoom/?resolution=4&lat=5758.5&lon=2689.5)
The Orange Leader newspaper stated there was a sundown sign on one of the roads in Vidor warning black people to be out before sundown. The signed warned black people not to let the sun set on them while they were in Vidor. (Ref: https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth556725/m1/1/zoom/?resolution=2&lat=5047.600432&lon=859.8934400000007)
The alleged sign was located on Wilson Street facing I 10 and had been located more than 3 blocks away the railroad. The sign was removed by the 1970s but later reappeared in a newly rebuilt condition. (Ref: https://livingbluetx.com/2021/08/vidor-sundown-town)
By the 1970s only two sundown signs remained intact. The sundown sign located on I 10 & Wilson Street remained for many years until around 1988 when the US government took the signs down. This was the sundown sign that read, "Nigger don't let the sun set on you in Vidor."
Detroit Free Press wrote a news article about Vidor’s attempt of changing their image and had reported the sundown sign was taken down a few years prior to 1993. So this meant that the very last sundown sign was removed sometime during the 1980s. (Ref: DETROIT FREE PRESS, Changing times run Klan out of town, https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/97547964/)
Here is how the sign came about and why the sign was erected in the middle of town.
A large hand-painted sign warning black people to get out of town after sundown was erected and constructed by the Vidor Original Knights of the Ku Klux Klan on Wilson Street in 1930 after a rape incident occurred where a black man raped a white woman. This incident was no different from any other rapes that occurred in any other southern town. There was one violent gruesome incident that made Vidor to become an all white sundown town permanently. The details of this incident are unsettling to many and shocking. (Ref: Texas Monthly, Vidor in Black And White, Mimi Swartz, December 1993, https://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/vidor-in-black-and-white/)
What happened is that a black man had raped a white woman in the middle of the night during midnight. The women had screamed loudly and had gotten the local Ku Klux Klan's attention. The Ku Klux Klan (KKK) went on to search for the rapist. These two black men were taken to a local fishing hole called Smiths Lake on the north side of town in Vidor’s Ward 6 neighborhood during the day. Three ropes dangled from a set of trees near Smiths Lake. Vidor’s Ku Klux Klan members [Vidor Original Knights of the Ku Klux Klan (VOKKKK)] had captured and lynched (hung) two black men “before they got the right one.” Eventually Klan members did find the third black male who had raped the white woman. They hung all 3 men by rope to make an example out of them. (Ref: Texas Monthly, Vidor in Black And White, Mimi Swartz, December 1993)
Vidor’s Ku Klux Klan members were members of the Vidor Original Knights of the Ku Klux Klan (VOKKKK) and Knights of the White Camellia (KWC) aka White Camellia Knights (WCK). They were the ones responsible for the lynching of those three black men. (Ref: https://www.genealogy.com/ftm/k/n/o/Jarrell-J-Knowles/BOOK-0001/0006-0001.html)
There was another incident in that same year where a black man was suspected of raping a white girl who was a minor. Klan members castrated that man’s privates parts through an act of mutilation and had a sign placed around his neck which read “Nigger, don’t let the sun set on you in Vidor.” (Ref: https://www.genealogy.com/ftm/k/n/o/Jarrell-J-Knowles/BOOK-0001/0017-0003.html)
So a large hand-painted sign warning black people to get out of town after sundown was erected and constructed by the Vidor Original Knights of the Ku Klux Klan in 1930 west of town on I 10 & Wilson Street. This particular sign read, "Niggers read this and run. If you can't read, run anyway. Nigger don't let the sun set on you in Vidor." The local KKK clearly did not want black citizens living in Vidor due to that reason. It was at that point that the KKK members had decided they did not want black citizens living in the city of Vidor.
The “Negro Sign Road” was located at 585 Wilson Street, Vidor, Texas, US 77662.
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