The Boxser Diversity Initiative is honored to lead the Sarasota & Manatee Community Remembrance Project, known for short as “Manasota Remembers”. We are partnered with Manasota ASALH, Newtown Alive and the Sarasota African American Cultural Coalition (SAACC) to bring a permanent memorial marker that honors lynching victims in this area. This project is based on the history and facts of racial violence in these counties and is in collaboration with the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI).
As EJI explains, “The Community Remembrance Project is a tool EJI offers to support communities looking to engage in this work. EJI’s community remembrance work is part of a larger movement to create an era of restorative truth-telling and justice that changes the consciousness of our nation.
We work with communities to erect historical markers, organize soil collection ceremonies, and hold essay contests for local high school students to support the development of local, community-led efforts to engage with and discuss past and present issues of racial justice. After active Community Remembrance work, EJI will also collaborate to place a monument — identical to the monument found at the National Memorial — in the community. EJI believes that markers and monuments can help transform our national landscape into a more honest reflection of the history of America and reflect a community’s ongoing commitment to truth-telling and racial justice.”
While the Lynching Marker will commemorate the six concretely documented victims of racial violence in Sarasota and Manatee counties, the marker is intended to commemorate all those who have experienced racial terror in Southwest Florida and across the country. To read more, go to the “stories” page.