Talk:List of sundown towns in the United States

Citations

Lead has no citations Iztwoz (talk) 09:20, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm late to this, but the lead does currently have a citation. Statements in the lead may be supported through linked articles. If additional references need to be added, please include them. I will do my best to improve this article in the meantime. — Paper Luigi ^{T • C} 05:36, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

Sourcing

What are the sources for these classifications? In at least a couple of cases in the subject articles, I found no reference to the exclusionary policies that would seem to be the basis for inclusion this list. JohnInDC (talk) 12:30, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

Ah, I see. The sourcing is the list at the bottom of the page. That being the case I think that each of the subject articles should be edited to reflect the facts & history that support the town's inclusion here, particularly if a "see also" link is added to those pages, which creates confusion. JohnInDC (talk) 12:35, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

I am concerned about the criteria for inclusion (or not) in this list. Looking further at the sourcing, the list on this page seems to be a subset of a list of sundown towns compiled by James W. Loewen, a historian, author and scholar, now published and preserved by Tougaloo College. (Loewen died in 2021.). It appears to reflect the slow, hard work of a lifetime.

According to the Tougaloo page, this is the only registry of sundown towns in the world. Link. The same page also states, "Not all towns are thoroughly confirmed. Look over the information provided and come to your own conclusion. Some towns are not and never were sundown towns but are listed for other reasons."

Setting aside the suitability of a singly-sourced List page such as this, we need to understand the criteria used to determine whether a town on the source list is or is not included in this Wikipedia list, and what the RS is for that determination. Let's discuss this please. JohnInDC (talk) 12:56, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

The James Loewen website is hosted by a university, but appears to be self-published with no editorial oversight. Magnolia677 (talk) 16:38, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

Does it fail then as an RS? JohnInDC (talk) 21:16, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

It looks self-published and blogish, but would go to WP:RSN for a consensus. Magnolia677 (talk) 21:42, 24 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes, it's not even clear what the criteria for inclusion on the source list are. This subject article defines a sundown town as one "characterized by intimidation, hostility, or violence among white residents directed especially toward Black people". However, the webpages accompanying the database describe something much broader: "A sundown town is not just a place where something racist happened. It is an entire community (or even county) that for decades was “all white” on purpose." - link. Indeed, a brief review of towns on the list reveals many for which there is no more evidence of a town's sundown status than the fact that the town is virtually (or actually) all-White, accompanied by unattributed comments from the internet. E.g., Brighton, Michigan.

This may be a useful list, a starting point for examining or revisiting the racial histories of certain towns to unearth old, unspoken but well-understood truths on a path to understanding and confronting them; but it doesn't appear to have been compiled with any kind of rigor or review, and the Tougaloo commentary concedes that the list is both incomplete and overinclusive. "Starting point" would seem to be the limit of the thing. It certainly seems insufficient to support a definitive List page on Wikipedia.

If anyone has other views about it, please comment! Thanks - JohnInDC (talk) 02:28, 26 August 2024 (UTC)

When I was creating this article, I gathered the location names from Category:Sundown towns in the United States and its state-specific subcategories. I cited Tougaloo because of Loewen's credibility, the book on sundown towns he authored, and the page's placement on the university website. Not all locations listed by Tougaloo were included due to the fact that it purports to contain rumored or unconfirmed sundown towns. In writing the lead, I used the sundown town article as a reference.

Since this article was created, I have put in more rigor and review by removing category links and most see also links on articles that don't specifically mention the practice of expelling nonwhite people (not limited to Black people) after sundown. Some see also links I kept if the article described a history of racial violence that didn't mention this practice. Of course, this was done on a case-by-case basis. Willingboro Township, New Jersey details housing discrimination; Pearl, Mississippi describes it historically as whites-only; and Pierce City, Missouri has a whole section on lynchings and expulsion. As none of the articles specifically mentioned sundown, categories were removed and see also links were kept.

Other towns fit a more strict definition to a T. Minden, Nevada mentions a daily siren originally meant to warn Native Americans to vacate the town that sounded as late as 2023, and Gardnerville, Nevada describes a similar siren that sounds to this day. Marlow, Oklahoma mentions that the city once had signs that plainly were meant to warn Black people to leave town before sunset. Elwood, Indiana includes a paragraph about the city government acknowledging its historical status as a sundown town.

With all of that said, I think the best path for this list would be for it to include a separate section listing locations with discriminatory policies and practices that are outside the more narrow definition of the term. I also think that the sundown towns article would benefit from a "definition" section that explains the confusion. — Paper Luigi ^{T • C} 06:31, 26 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for explaining.

Where a town's article describes the events underlying a town's label as a sundown town, it's appropriately included on this list and in Category:Sundown towns in the United States. But I don't think it's proper (and is certainly confusing) to include a city or town on this list where that city or town's own Wikipedia article makes no mention of the historic (or current) practices that explain why it's a sundown town. Any time a town is added to this list, we need to add the underlying info to the town article. But that is easier said than done, I think.

First, the Loewen list is not rigorous and not editorially reviewed (that we know of). It seems to have been compiled over time by one man, an associate or two, and his students. I don't think it's an RS and I don't think we can take matters described in it as true without some other third party sourcing of those items. IMHO the database is, at best, a pointer, a suggestion that we identify other, reliable sources that describe the events or practices and thereby verify them. I would not be comfortable adding underlying facts to a town's article on the sole basis of this database.

Second, and related, is whether the verified facts warrant the label "sundown town". The database title notwithstanding, a town's inclusion on the Loewen list does not make it a sundown town. This is by its own terms. In other words the database is no good, in and of itself, for the classification - that determination has to be made separately. IMHO we as editors are not qualified to make the essentially subjective decision whether, based on the information contained in the database, a particular town in fact qualifies as a sundown town under a more traditional definition. We'd be mixing and matching - the unstated criteria that put a town on the Loewen list, and the classic definition of a "sundown town". This issue too points us to other, actual RSs, for that determination - to another source that describes X town as a sundown town. Indeed if no source other than this (not reliable, overinclusive) list identifies a town as a sundown town then why is Wikipedia saying it is?

I guess a third concern is, I'm not sure what this list page adds that we don't already get with Category:Sundown towns in the United States.

I guess in the end I have some pretty fundamental issues with this page and wonder what we can do to fix it. JohnInDC (talk) 13:07, 26 August 2024 (UTC)

To your first point, this list could utilize the RS found in the individual town articles (provided those sources are vetted and deemed reliable). Loewen does not have to be used as a source at all, although I think it would benefit readers if it were kept in the external links section.

To your second point, again, the database does not have to be used. Every entry on this list as of my last edit has some mention in the target article about being a sundown town. If those individual articles are inadequately sourced, that will need to change on those pages too. The category and subcategories existed in a bloated state with too little oversight, which means WP had been calling all those places sundown towns for far longer than this list article has been live.

For your last concern, the category page is an inferior experience for the reader compared to a list. Viewing a category obscures its entries with multiple subcategories, and only a brief explanation of the subject is at the top. A list article displays everything on one page with room for a full lead, multiple sections, quotes, images, and citations. List entries could be expanded with prose to give the reader more context or reformatted to aid readability. This list isn't fully fleshed-out yet, but it certainly has the potential to get there. — Paper Luigi ^{T • C} 15:00, 26 August 2024 (UTC)

If Loewen isn't a source (or is a secondary, "just FYI" source) and the list is based on sources showing on the town page - then great. There's maybe a quibble about who exactly is determining that a town is a "sundown town", absent any RS that actually says it, but if we (well, you) are conservative in what you put into that group (evidence restrictive covenants, statutes, lynchings etc.) and those facts are well-sourced, then there won't any reason really to quibble. Thanks for talking this through. JohnInDC (talk) 16:21, 26 August 2024 (UTC)

All of the entries without descriptions and sources should be tagged individually with a citation needed tag. There might be information in the main article, but when I checked two entries for Maryland, I found issues. For Chevy Chase, there was a single developer who built expensive houses (justifiably they are still expensive to this day). This had the effect in the late 19th century blacks could not afford to live there - there were otherwise no restrictions on blacks moving there. This is a silly argument for sundowning, in that case every expensive neighborhood in the country was sundowning. The other case in Silver Spring, is a clear case of sundowning, with codified legal restrictions where blacks could live, but our main article did not do a good job explaining it and I had to find better information in the sources. So, all these entries need review and better sourcing, and some of the examples of sundowning are weak, like the one in Kentucky about about a black-owned brothel that had a sign not letting in black johns - seriously a single brothel establishment is the bar for entry into this list? It's not a town. -- GreenC 16:07, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

All unreferenced entries have now been tagged. A handful of towns in Texas are not tagged because they include sources even though the descriptions have not been written yet. This list is a work in progress, and descriptions have been written as my time allows.

Chevy Chase was added to the list by an anonymous user, and while its standing as a sundown town has some merit, it should not be inserted back into this list without more definitive evidence.

Silver Spring is an interesting case due to the 1939 property deed mentioned in the town's article, which prohibited "Armenians, Jews, Hebrews, Persians, Syrians, Greeks and Turks" from living in the town unless they were "domestic servants of a different race domiciled with an owner or tenant." Tangentially, the use of the word owner in that description, written 74 years after the U.S. abolished slavery, speaks volumes on the community's contemporary attitudes toward race.

Mayfield, Kentucky, had multiple brothels with anti-Black (male) signage, not just a single brothel. That kind of business-specific discrimination does not merit classifying Mayfield as a sundown town, and its entry on this page has been removed. — Paper Luigi ^{T • C} 04:46, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, and watching out for this page. -- GreenC 20:04, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

All entries are now sourced. — Paper Luigi ^{T • C} 06:32, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

Carrboro, NC

This list is incorrect! They list Carrboro, NC as a sundown town and nothing could be further than the truth — I know because I grew up here and live here. As a “suburb” of Chapel Hill, Carrboro is known as probably the most liberal town in NC. We’ve had a succession of gay mayors and the current mayor is a black women. I think like 90% of registered voters are democratic and the town is mostly integrated in the neighborhoods. 2600:1702:51E1:3F3F:4522:35F2:92ED:5A59 (talk) 20:46, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

It's great to know that Carrboro has evolved into a more accepting place for all people to reside. Certainly many sundown towns have gotten with the times and abandoned their antiquated attitudes about race. This list is not limited to current sundown towns but rather towns that practice or once practiced that form of racial segregation, as noted in the lead.

Historically, Carrboro was not a welcoming place for non-whites; former Mayor Robert Drakeford, the town's first Black mayor, described Carrboro as a "sundown town". Incidentally, Carrboro is named in honor of an abject racist and white supremacist who fought for the Confederacy and, during the dedication of a Confederate monument, boasted about horsewhipping a Black woman while a hundred federal soldiers watched.

With this topic specifically, there is always more to it that was never written down or discussed much during the time it happened. I have purposely limited this list to places that characteristically fit the sundown town mold at one point in history, and Carrboro is (or was) one such place. As an aside, your comment is unrelated the section you posted it in ("Sourcing"), and I split it off into a new section. — Paper Luigi ^{T • C} 04:41, 2 September 2024 (UTC)