Lynching memorial offers chance to remember, heal

Set to open April 26 in Montgomery, Ala.

In this Wednesday, April 18, 2018 photo, Josephine Bolling McCall poses with a photo of her father, lynching victim Elmore Bolling, at her home in Montgomery, Ala. Bolling is among thousands of lynching victims remembered at the new National Memorial for Peace and Justice, erected with donations by the Alabama-based Equal Justice Initiative. The memorial and an accompanying museum, which aim to tell the story of racial oppression in the United States, open April 26. - photo by Associated Press

W newlynching — In this Wednesday, April 18, 2018 photo, Josephine Bolling McCall poses with a photo of her father, lynching victim Elmore Bolling, at her home in Montgomery, Ala. Bolling is among thousands of lynching victims remembered at the new National Memorial for Peace and Justice, erected with donations by the Alabama-based Equal Justice Initiative. The memorial and an accompanying museum, which aim to tell the story of racial oppression in the United States, open April 26. - photo by Associated Press

MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Elmore Bolling defied the odds against black men and built several successful businesses during the harsh era of Jim Crow segregation in the South. He had more money than a lot of whites, which his descendants believe was all it took to get him lynched in 1947.He was shot to death by a white neighbor, according to news accounts at the time, and the shooter was never prosecuted.But Bolling's name is now listed among thousands on a new memorial for victims of hate-inspired lynchings that terrorized generations of U.S. blacks. Daughter Josephine Bolling McCall is anxious to see the monument, located about 20 miles from where her father was killed in rural Lowndes County.The National Memorial for Peace and Justice, opening Thursday, is a project of the nonprofit Equal Justice Initiative, a legal advocacy group in Montgomery.

Associated Press

Associated Press