#fred rouse

1012 N. Main Street, Fort Worth, Texas, USA,

In 1921, Fred Rouse, a Black packinghouse worker, was brutally lynched in Fort Worth, Texas in front of a crowd of over 100 onlookers. He was first assaulted with iron bars by a mob of White union workers, who accused him of breaking their strike. 

Then the White mob pulled him out of the hospital where he was receiving treatment and killed him. Last year, a century after his death, the Equal Justice Initiative, with the help of Rouse’s grandson, created a memorial for the slain man.

Now, Fort Worth is again reckoning with its racist past as the former Texas headquarters of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) is being transformed into the Fred Rouse Center for Arts and Community Healing. The initiative is spearheaded by the Texas arts nonprofit Transform 1012 N. Main Street, which purchased the building in 2021. The center is expected to open in 2025.

Photo Ken Sparks; courtesy Fort Worth Camera Club and Transform 1012 N. Main Street.

Text Courtesy of Hyperallergic