Essay 4899

From The Chicago Tribune…

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3 TOWNS: THE PAST, THE PRESENT, THE FUTURE

No black-and-white answers

Several months after racial injustices were exposed, some wounds have begun to heal. And some have festered.

By Howard Witt, Tribune senior correspondent

Plotted on a map, the towns of Paris, Linden and Jena line up neatly along a 300-mile diagonal that falls across the Texas-Louisiana border.

But to many African-Americans, that line looks more like a gash across the beneficent face that the New South tries to present to the rest of the nation.

In each of those three mostly white towns, local incidents of perceived discrimination against blacks drew national outrage and civil rights protests after the Tribune wrote stories about them, thrusting their long-obscured racial tensions into the open during a tumultuous year.

Now, Tribune senior correspondent Howard Witt has returned to discover whether the fundamental racial dynamics of Linden, Paris and Jena were altered in any meaningful way after the TV cameras departed and the headlines faded away.

The answer in Linden appears to be yes. In Paris, not much. And in Jena, it’s too soon to tell.

As spotlight dims, shadows remain

The stories read to many like harrowing echoes from the worst days of the Jim Crow South.

[To read the full story, click here.]