news-record.com

Skip to the site menu
Skip to search

NEWS

Advertisement | Advertise with Us

Events commemorate Klan-Nazi shootings

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

(Updated 5:45 am)

By Joe Killian
Staff Writer

GREENSBORO — Today marks the 30th anniversary of the Klan-Nazi shootings that killed five and injured 10 in 1979.

Local students, clergy and community leaders are commemorating the tragedy with a “Truth, Justice and Healing Conference” from Wednesday through Saturday.

James Joseph, former U.S. ambassador to South Africa under President Bill Clinton, will be the keynote speaker.

The shootings happened Nov. 3, 1979, before a “Death to the Klan” march through the Morningside Homes public housing complex.

A group of Ku Klux Klan members and members of the neo-Nazi National Socialist Party of America arrived in a caravan of cars to confront marchers from the Communist

Workers Party, then known as the Workers Viewpoint Organization. Marchers beat on the cars as they passed and both sides fired shots in the ensuing gunbattle.

Five anti-Klan demonstrators were killed:

* Cesar Vicente Cauce, 25, a Cuban immigrant and magna cum laude graduate of Duke University.

* Dr. Michael Ronald Nathan, 32, chief of pediatrics at Durham’s Lincoln Community Health Center.

* William Evan Sampson, 31, a graduate of Harvard Divinity School.

* Sandra Neely Smith, 28, a nurse and civil rights activist.

* Dr. James Michael Waller, 36, who had given up his medical practice to organize workers and become president of a local textile workers’ union.

The violence was captured by TV cameras and became national news, the subject of books and pop songs.

Klan and neo-Nazi group members were twice acquitted of all criminal charges by all-white juries, creating a racial controversy that affects politics and race relations in the city to the present day.

A civil trial later found members of the Greensboro Police Department and Klan and neo-Nazi group members jointly liable for the wrongful death of one of those killed.

Lingering questions and resentments about the shootings led to the creation of the Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 2005.

The commission, patterned on similar groups in post-apartheid South Africa, took public testimony and investigated the facts of the confrontation and its aftermath. A report prepared by the group has been controversial, with people disagreeing about its conclusions.

Though the Greensboro City Council initially opposed the efforts of the commission, the council issued a statement in June regretting the confrontation.

On Wednesday, students, activists and community leaders will gather at the A&T Four sit-in statue on the Dudley Street side of N.C. A&T’s campus. The group will walk downtown to the Greensboro Historical Museum for a viewing of “Greensboro: Getting Closer to the Truth,” a film about the truth and reconciliation process by New York filmmaker Adam Zucker.

Other events will continue throughout the week, culminating with former Ambassador Joseph’s keynote address at 1:30 p.m. Saturday in Pfeiffer Chapel at Bennett College.

Contact Joe Killian at 373-7023 or joe.killian@news-record.com

What do you think?

20 comment(s)

Read other visitors' comments.

Comments

This article has been closed to new comments. Comments are generally closed after 14 days. However, comments may be closed earlier at the discretion of the News & Record.

Inappropriate content? Please notify us.

Carolinaslim

November 3, 2009 - 6:37 am EST

Greensboro just can't let this go. Especially News-Record and News 2. The trials were held, the books and tv shows were done. I was here then plus many years before. The story is done. The history is there. Continually bringing it to the forefront in this city serves to divide rather than heal. My opinion is that its a tired old story that continues to perpetuate divisiveness rather than heal.

J Peterman Reality Tour

November 3, 2009 - 9:51 am EST

Well the censors of N&R are at it again . . . a lot of folks don't care about this issue or think it's credible or worthy of "celebration" based on the facts proved. Given a poll of who really gives a crap about this you'd find 90% of blacks think its a "BIG" deal esp. when a gang of blacks started this . . . the rest of us are just waiting for the city counsel to write some big fat check to all those "imaginary" victims . . . another handout.

Maybe blacks can get the federal government involved in another lawsuit . . . only to later drop out, "BECAUSE THERE IS NO CREDIBILTY TO IT" (ie., ref. 39 black officers sue city for racial discrimination)

gsostudent

November 3, 2009 - 6:23 pm EST

Maybe it will surprise you to know that Neill McNeill, senior news anchor at the local FOX station posted this on Twitter yesterday:

@namcneill: "30 Years Later In Greensboro:" my thoughts and memories heading into tomorrow's Greensboro Massacre Anniversary: http://bit.ly/43ZYVh

Brandon Burgess

November 3, 2009 - 7:37 am EST

The majority of Greensboro has moved on. The tragic past events involving extremists do not affect how me and my neighbors in this diverse community treat each other. The sad fact is, those involved will never move on, and how can we expect them to? Many of them feel that an injustice was done to them that day, and I'm sure many of them feel remorse for their involvement. The best Greensboro can do is respect their viewpoint, present ours, and move on.

jackhartjj

November 3, 2009 - 7:40 am EST

Hey Joe, you forgot a few key points here. You either did not do your research well...or maybe it is the same bias the News and Record and the liberal folks involved have been trying to cram down the publics throats for years!
Here goes;
#1-The Communist Workers Party...note the word communist!...led by nelson johnson, invited the klan and nazis to the "Death to the Klan March"! Note that the commies told them to come on down, we will kill you! The klan and nazis, being the same type idiots as the commies obliged!
#2-The police ultimately were not told the location this would take place.
#3-The commies would not cooporate in the trials, the juries apparently had no choice but to do what they did.
#4- The commies chose Morningside Homes as the location, wonder why there as opposed to anywhere else in the city?
#5-nelson johnson, who was the ringleader in the circus showed he was a manly-man by cowering under a car while his comrades were dying around him!
And by the way, the textile mills they organized, one was Bates Nightwear, which had become Gerber Babywear, and had been in business for many years. A lady that was fast sewing could make very good money. Within two weeks of the union coming in the piecework rate was slashed...something about it not being 'fair' to folks that were slower not making as much as the faster ones! It was not to much longer before Bates was gone!
I could go on and on...You get the gist!

Get Real

November 3, 2009 - 12:35 pm EST

"being the same type idiots as the commies"

I guess they'll just let any ol' idiot become a doctor or graduate from Duke.

Lakeshia

November 3, 2009 - 7:55 am EST

What a crock of Pelosi -

Highmiles

November 3, 2009 - 8:16 am EST

The reality of this event continues to be rewritten by many who wish to keep it alive. A group wishing to acquire martyrs got their wish. Remembering the shifting memories as they are brought to ever different conclusions is a terrible idea. Let it go.

laserguidedloogie

November 3, 2009 - 8:47 am EST

So the Klan and the Nazis had a shoot out? Really? When? Strange I never heard about that one.

I did hear about the Klan and the Nazis shooting some communist a few years ago...

Ken
http://www.LaserGuidedLoogie.com

NC Girly

November 3, 2009 - 9:25 am EST

Nothing like beating a 30 year old dead horse! Ummm...let me think about where I was at this time this "event" took place, oh wait I've got it...I was running around in a diaper, playing in a sandbox! I don't know about the rest of the folks here, but in my opinion you had two groups of lunatics (neither group choose to be rational) who created a tragic situation, over 30 years ago. We have much more pressing issues to discuss, you know, our CURRENT community issues, like job loss, our CURRENT crime problem, ummm...wallpaper. Grrrrr! Stop living in the negative past and move on to the positive future.

gsostudent

November 3, 2009 - 6:29 pm EST

Your ridiculous argument that the past doesn't affect the future is not only ignorant but dangerous. Many of the problems we're facing today were relevant in 1979 as well, particularly police corruption and institutional racism. What are you doing to help the community move into the future? The Beloved Community Center is certainly doing more than you are to move this City in the right direction. Part of the reason we have so few jobs in Greensboro is that capitalism does NOT work to benefit most people so when the CAPITALISTS moved jobs to Mexico and elsewhere they did so with no regard to how it would destroy Greensboro communities and families that were reliant on the textile industry. You need to understand the past in order to not repeat the same mistakes. It's idiotic to think that following the same capitalist path of attracting big companies to move to Greensboro will somehow solve our job problem. In a couple of years, they'll move away too! (read up on Dell, for example)

mohair.sam

November 4, 2009 - 8:43 am EST

GSOstudent: You're mouthing the communist-loving platitudes of your teachers with aplomb. Capitalism is a deeply flawed system, indeed. But the communism you're awkwardly dancing around -- which the CWP and its modern offshoots openly embraced -- directly led to the government-driven murders of over 100 million people in the century just past. The killing fields of Cambodia ... Kolyma and the other gulags of the Soviet Union (to say nothing of the Holomodor during the Great Terror in the Ukraine) ... Mao's insane government programs, such as Let a Thousand Flowers Bloom and The Great Leap Forward, which led to the murders of nearly 40 million people ... the various purges of Eastern Europe, along with the forced starvation of over 1 million North Koreans in the 1990s ... I could go on and on, but I'm sure I'm wasting my keystrokes. There is nothing to learn from what happened in 1979, save that communists and racists are dangerous, utterly irresponsible garbage who are quite happy to put innocent people at risk in order to score political points. Remember, the CWP went to Davidson County -- armed -- to confront the Klan before the "rally" at Morningside.
As for racism in the GPD: You are aware that the chief is a black man? Good grief, the "R" card gets thrown down so quickly by local lefties.

GboroMan

November 3, 2009 - 9:55 am EST

Since when does a commemoration designate that the entire city is "living in the past"? Do we commemorate the Declaration of Independence and the nation's founding on July 4th? Of course, as we should. But that doesn't mean we pine for the days of no electricity, no cars, the reestablishment of slavery, the taking away of women's rights as existed in 1776 and for a long time after, and on and on. Commemoration does not mean a desire to replay events and refight old battles, it means to remember and respect the past. You may not like the stain of that gun battle 30 years ago (only 30 years ago!) but it happened, and it should not be whitewashed as if it never occurred. Any group of people who think violence is the answer to their perceived problems are to be condemned, but I still get Klan/Nazi propaganda in my Greensboro driveway once or twice a year. As Faulkner said: "The past is not dead. In fact, it's not even past."

gsostudent

November 3, 2009 - 6:31 pm EST

Thank you GboroMan. The Klan put flyers on my campus in the past few years, and in case people forgot the largest neo-nazi organization in the country was in Greensboro in August. Not to mention how racist the GPD continue to be...

mohair.sam

November 4, 2009 - 8:46 am EST

Nobody is ignoring the past, or trying to whitewash it. What many of us are saying is simply this: ENOUGH. Given the constant breast-beating over this, you'd think half the city was exterminated. It was a terrible event for those immediately involved, to be sure, but for most of us, it's history -- history that's been blown enormously out of proportion.

Get Real

November 3, 2009 - 12:23 pm EST

All you people who have "moved on" sure do love to read these stories. Please shut up.

NC Girly

November 3, 2009 - 1:29 pm EST

My point here is this "call to remembrance" or commemorate only feeds on the ongoing hate problems we have in society now. No one is suggesting forgetting or whitewashing anything, however, this article seems to make the Greensboro News and Record quite often and at this point they are beating it into the ground. Yes it was 30 years ago and although it hasn't been that long ago I'd like to believe society has made leaps and bounds in the matters of a positive direction. There are always going to be that select few group of under minded idiots, but that is in all groups of people. I may not receive the unwanted "gifts" from the Klan/Nazi groups in my driveway, but I can assure you there is no shortage of racial propaganda shoved in my face from every race on a weekly basis. Does that bother me? No, you know why? Because I realize those types of people don't even exist in my world. As for the "Faulkner said: The past is not dead. In fact, it's not even past"....well it is past to me. I don't live my life in that mentally! I do, however get tired of the constant replay of negative events such as this one.

gsostudent

November 3, 2009 - 6:34 pm EST

If you're tired of the constant replay of negative events you shouldn't read the News & Record. They barely report on anything besides crime that's happening and have almost no coverage of positive efforts of people in the community.

If you actually looked up what this conference is going to include (which is mostly left out of the N&R article) you'd know that most of it is focused on discussing how we can move forward as a community and have more social justice. You might actually be interested in getting involved in something positive.

Edugator

November 3, 2009 - 5:11 pm EST

The Teaching Tolerance Project has released a set of lesson plans to help students look at the different perspectives on the Greensboro Massacre. It's a very interesting, fair-minded piece. You might want to take a look: http://www.tolerance.org/activity/what-truth

gsostudent

November 3, 2009 - 6:40 pm EST

1. Wasn't the organization called the American Nazi Party?
2. Sandra Smith was also a graduate from Bennett College and was the SGA president while she was there.
3. How come there is almost no information about the role of the police, specifically that there was a paid police informant and ATF informant in these organizations who warned of the Klan's intention for violence?
4. What pop songs are you referring to?
5. Can you please explain why the GPD was found liable?
6. Can you please include the times and locations of the commemoration events, maybe along with the name of who's organizing it or contact info so I know where to go in order to attend? Thanks