Orange County Election Day Violence

Marker Text: Leading up to Election Day on November 2, 1920, the Ku Klux Klan and the United Confederate Veterans held rallies and parades to discourage African Americans from voting. County officials arranged for the local notary public to be out of town, so that there would be no one to legally affirm that voters had paid their poll taxes. On Election Day, only African Americans were challenged to prove they had paid the tax. One African American man, Mose Norman, attempted to vote at the Ocoee polling place, but was refused entry. Norman left and returned later, but was beaten and driven from the site. An armed group of white citizens sought to arrest Norman. They went first to the home of Julius “July” Perry, a prominent African American businessman, but by the time they arrived, Norman had fled. The group attempted to enter Perry’s home, but the family resisted. A gunfight ensued that left two whites dead and Perry gravely injured. He was taken to the Orange County Jail in Orlando, but a white mob secured his release and lynched him near the home of Judge John M. Cheney. Perry was later buried in Orlando’s Greenwood Cemetery. This event led to further tragedy in Orange County.

In 1920, the Ocoee area included two African American communities, Northern Quarters and Southern Quarters. A white mob reported to be at least 100 persons entered Northern Quarters on November 3, 1920. During a long house-to-house gun battle, the mob set fire to buildings owned by or serving African Americans, including a lodge, homes, businesses, schools, and churches. Anyone attempting to flee a burning building was shot, and those who remained died in the fire. In the days following, residents of Southern Quarters were told to abandon their property or face the same fate. Based on 1920 census data, 495 African American residents in Ocoee were driven out. Local authorities confiscated the abandoned property, and divided it amongst the white residents of the area. No records of the deaths were kept, and those related to the property sales were lost. African Americans did not return to the area until the 1980s. Ocoee’s population rapidly grew and diversified with the housing construction boom. In acknowledgement of its past, the Ocoee City Commission formed Florida’s first human relations diversity advisory board in 2006, and designated a portion of Lakefront Park as an area of remembrance and reflection in 2019.