anti-Southern Bigot Once Again Comes After Protected Hot Springs Memorial (AR)
Confederate monument becomes topic of discussion at recent Hot Springs board meeting
Confederate monument becomes topic of discussion at recent Hot Springs board meeting
(Sentinel Record) - The United Daughters of the Confederacy Hot Springs Chapter 80 said its monument does not mark the exact location where Black men were lynched in 1913 and 1922.
The chapter told the city in a March 9 letter to Mayor Pat McCabe that lynchings occurred to the north and south of the monument. The letter was in response to a discussion about gateways to downtown at the Hot Springs Board of Directors’ March 3 business meeting.
District 2 Director Phyllis Beard asked Visit Hot Springs CEO Steve Arrison if he planned to relocate the monument, telling him two Black men were lynched there.
The question came after Arrison had asked the board to remove the special status that allows community groups to use the city’s Church Street parking lot. Arrison said feeding programs held there take away parking for visitors and create a negative first impression for those who approach downtown from Malvern Avenue. He suggested moving them to the Community Resource Center on Hobson Avenue.
“In the conversations about where we can move unsightly things, I want (the monument) part of the conversation, because it is abhorrent,” Beard told Arrison. “It’s horrible to look at, and a lot of people don’t want to look at that, so let’s have that conversation together. You’re the most powerful man in the city, and I know you can get things done.”
The local chapter said that, based on historical documentation and photographic analysis, the…
