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‘HIS BLOOD IS IN THE SOIL’: THE KENTUCKY GROUP HONORING VICTIMS
OF LYNCHINGS  
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Gloria Oladipo
June 28, 2025
The Guardian
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_ Since 2021, the Eastern Kentucky Remembrance Project has been
planting markers memorializing Black residents killed by racist
violence. On 31 May, a historical marker was placed outside the former
Wayland jail where Fred Shannon was killed in 1924. _

People install a marker memorializing the 1924 lynching of Fred
Shannon, a Black man who was falsely accused of killing a white man,
in Wayland, Kentucky, photograph: Darryl “Dee” Parker

 

On 26 October 1924, Fred Shannon, a Black man, was lynched at age 28
by a mob of nearly 200 masked residents in Wayland, Kentucky
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Shannon, a local musician, was falsely accused of killing a white man
over a financial dispute. While was he being held at a local jail, the
mob broke in, took him out in the street and shot him at least 18
times.

For decades, Shannon’s lynching and the murders of other Black men
in the region went largely unnoticed, lost to history. But over the
past four years the Eastern Kentucky Remembrance Project (EKRP), an
interracial, intergenerational coalition of residents, has come
together to memorialize their lives – and deaths. In May, the group
successfully placed a remembrance marker for Shannon. EKRP managed to
find a relative of Shannon, who will visit the site within the year.
Research is already underway for more markers to honor those who were
lynched in eastern Kentucky, carrying on the years-long tradition.

Founded in 2021, the EKRP has worked to honor Black people who were
lynched in the region with plaques and other markers. The group also
cleans up a Black cemetery in the area as a part of its annual
Decoration Day celebration.

The project was first started during a Zoom meeting for the
Kentuckians for the Commonwealth Group, EKRP’s parent organization.
John and Jean Rosenberg, who founded the EKRP, had visited the Legacy
Museum, run by the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), based in
Montgomery, Alabama, and learned of Shannon’s lynching in Floyd
county. The pair wanted to acknowledge the travesties that had taken
place, according to members in the meeting. “It’s important for us
to face this history,” said John
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a 2021 press release about the group’s founding.

Five years later, Shannon’s memorial service took place.

On 31 May, a historical marker provided by grants from the EJI was
placed outside the former Wayland jail where Shannon was killed, now a
neighborhood liquor store. Dirt from the site was collected for the
EJI’s Community Remembrance Project, which houses soil from various
lynching sites across the country.

Darryl “Dee” Parker, an EKR member, participated in the ceremony,
calling it “bittersweet” to memorialize Shannon while also
recognizing the immense violence done to him. “It was just something
about touching the soil,” Parker said, who is Black. “Just started
having this little flashback, [thinking how] Fred’s blood is in the
soil somewhere.”

Parker, like many participants in the project, have personal
connections to lynching that took place in the area. During a visit
to EJI, Parker learned that several of his own family members had been
lynched in Kentucky. Tom Brown, a male relative, had been lynched in
Nicholasville, Kentucky, after being accused of speaking to a white
woman. Another family member was lynched in Midway, Kentucky;
Parker’s family believes that he was working at a local distillery
and was accused of stealing liquor. His grandmother later confirmed
the news, figuring that Parker had already known. “Nobody really
talked about this in the family. If I didn’t uncover that, then that
would have been lost, because I wouldn’t be able to tell my kids and
grandkids and so forth,” Parker said.

Beverly May, member of EKR and longtime eastern Kentucky resident,
also has personal ties to Shannon’s killing. May, who was on the
initial Zoom call that sparked EKR’s creation, was “stunned” to
learn about Shannon’s lynching in the region. “I was really
horrified that the lynching, something that I thought just happened in
the south, happened a few miles from my house.”

Wayland’s own mayor hadn’t known Shannon’s killing was a
lynching, assuming that it was punishment for murder. May soon learned
she had a connection to Shannon’s lynching; she discovered that her
great-grandfather was sheriff of the county when Shannon’s murder
occurred. During a family reunion in 2022, May asked her relatives if
they had heard anything about Shannon’s lynching, especially as
hundreds of men had participated. “They all shook their heads and
said: ‘No,’” said May, who is white. “I don’t know if they
told me the truth or not, but I know that there was no further
discussion except, ‘No, I didn’t know that,’” May added.

[people standing ]
People commemorate the placement of Fred Shannon’s
marker. Photograph: Darryl “Dee” Parker

The work remains as relevant as ever, said EKR members, especially as
the Trump administration continues to attack the teaching and
archiving of Black history. Trump has also pledged to bring back
statues commemorating Confederate leaders, many of which were
successfully removed during 2020.

A handful of residents in eastern Kentucky have been unsupportive of
EKRP’s efforts, said Parker. “Some people in the town were like,
‘What about the white man who got killed? What about this? What
about that?’” he said.

But the majority of people have been in favor of EKRP’s mission and
unaware of such violence taking place in the community. “There’s
other people that didn’t even know this history at all. [They were]
like, ‘Thank you. I’m glad you all are doing this.’” The stone
marker even got a “blessing” from the liquor store owner, a quiet
man named Bobby who gave EKRP full permission to memorialize Shannon
on his land, said Parker.

The memorial was another form of resistance, especially as racial
justice progress nationwide swings backward. “I have been in
mourning since the election,” said May. “I am more shocked by the
depth and the comprehensiveness of the move toward autocracy, blatant
racism and blatant misogyny.”

She added: “ the Trump administration has no say so about it. It’s
these little steps of remembrance and reconciliation are more
important than ever and will continue to be.”

* Equal Justice Initiative
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* Kentucky
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* lynchings
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* racist violence
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