Louisville riots of 1968
Encyclopedia
The Louisville riots of 1968 refers to riots in Louisville, Kentucky
Louisville, Kentucky
Louisville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Kentucky, and the county seat of Jefferson County. Since 2003, the city's borders have been coterminous with those of the county because of a city-county merger. The city's population at the 2010 census was 741,096...

 in May 1968. As in many other cities around the country, there were unrest and riots partially in response to the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. On May 27, 1968, a group of 400 people, mostly blacks, gathered at Twenty-Eight and Greenwood Streets, in the Parkland
Parkland, Louisville
Parkland is a neighborhood in Louisville, Kentucky, USA. Its boundaries are 34th Street on the west, West Broadway on the north, Woodland Avenue on the south and 26th Street on the east....

 neighborhood. The intersection, and Parkland in general, had recently become an important location for Louisville's black community, as the local NAACP branch had moved its office there.

The crowd was protesting the possible reinstatement of a white officer who had been suspended for beating a black man some weeks earlier. Several community leaders arrived and told the crowd that no decision had been reached, and alluded to disturbances in the future if the officer was reinstated. By 8:30, the crowd began to disperse.

However, rumors (which turned out to be untrue) were spread that Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee ' was one of the principal organizations of the American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. It emerged from a series of student meetings led by Ella Baker held at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina in April 1960...

 speaker Stokely Carmichael
Stokely Carmichael
Kwame Ture , also known as Stokely Carmichael, was a Trinidadian-American black activist active in the 1960s American Civil Rights Movement. He rose to prominence first as a leader of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and later as the "Honorary Prime Minister" of the Black Panther Party...

's plane to Louisville was being intentionally delayed by whites. After bottles were thrown by the crowd, the crowd became unruly and police were called. However the small and unprepared police response simply upset the crowd more, which continued to grow. The police, including a captain who was hit in the face by a bottle, retreated, leaving behind a patrol car, which was turned over and burned.

By midnight, rioters had looted stores as far east as Fourth Street, overturned cars and started fires.

Within an hour, Mayor Kenneth A. Schmied
Kenneth A. Schmied
Kenneth Allen Schmied , a Republican, served as Mayor of Louisville, Kentucky.Schmied was the son of a Swiss immigrant who sold coffee door to door and later owned a furniture store. Kenneth A...

 requested 700 Kentucky National Guard
Kentucky National Guard
The Kentucky National Guard consists of the:*Kentucky Army National Guard*Kentucky Air National Guard-External links:** compiled by the United States Army Center of Military History...

 troops and established a city-wide curfew. Violence and vandalism continued to rage the next day, but had subdued somewhat by May 29. Business owners began to return, although troops remained until June 4. Police made 472 arrests related to the riots. Two black teenage rioters had died, and $200,000 in damage had been done.

The disturbances had a longer-lasting effect. Most white business owners quickly pulled out or were forced, by the threat of racial violence, out of Parkland and surrounding areas. Most white residents also left the West End, which had been almost entirely white north of Broadway, from subdivision until the 1960s. The riot would have effects that shaped the image which whites would hold of Louisville's West End, that it was predominantly black and crime ridden.

See also

  • 1968 Washington, D.C. riots
    1968 Washington, D.C. riots
    Five days of race riots erupted in Washington, D.C. following the April 4, 1968 assassination of Civil Rights Movement-leader Martin Luther King, Jr. Civil unrest affected at least 110 U.S...

  • Baltimore riot of 1968
    Baltimore riot of 1968
    The Baltimore Riot of 1968 began two days after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968. Rioting broke out in 125 cities across the United States, and spread to the city of Baltimore, Maryland on Saturday, April 6. The Governor of Maryland, Spiro T...

  • Bloody Monday
    Bloody Monday
    Bloody Monday was the name given the election riots of August 6, 1855, in Louisville, Kentucky. These riots grew out of the bitter rivalry between the Democrats and supporters of the Know-Nothing Party. Rumors were started that foreigners and Catholics had interfered with the process of voting...

  • History of Louisville, Kentucky
    History of Louisville, Kentucky
    The history of Louisville, Kentucky spans hundreds of years, with thousands of years of human habitation. The area's geography and location on the Ohio River attracted people from the earliest times. The city is located at the Falls of the Ohio River...

  • List of incidents of civil unrest in the United States
  • List of riots
  • Protests of 1968
    Protests of 1968
    The protests of 1968 consisted of a worldwide series of protests, largely participated in by students and workers.-Background:Background speculations of overall causality vary about the political protests centering on the year 1968. Some argue that protests could be attributed to the social changes...

  • NAACP in Kentucky
    NAACP in Kentucky
    NAACP in Kentucky is very active with branches all over the state, largest being in Louisville and Lexington. The continues today to fight against injustices and for the equality of all people....


External links

  • Louisville's Black Power Riot, 1968 Extensive paper on the riots by University of Louisville
    University of Louisville
    The University of Louisville is a public university in Louisville, Kentucky. When founded in 1798, it was the first city-owned public university in the United States and one of the first universities chartered west of the Allegheny Mountains. The university is mandated by the Kentucky General...

    professor Bruce M. Tyler
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