For those who thought lynching was a grim chapter in history books, this film is an eye opener.

In 1998, in Jasper, Texas, the Ku Klux Klan killed an African American by dragging him behind a truck while his body shattered. In response to this outrageous crime, a Texas court, for the first time ever, condemned a white man to death for the murder of a black man.

The film introduces James Cameron, who tells first-hand how he narrowly survived being lynched by an angry mob in Marion, Indiana when he was 16 years old. He was dragged from his home and falsely accused of raping and murdering a white woman. His elderly mother prayed in vain to be taken in place of her son. As a rope was being placed around his neck next to two young men already hanged, the sheriff intervened and had him imprisoned instead for the crime he never committed.

Now in his 80s, Cameron has created a museum in Milwaukee to keep alive the memory of man’s inhumanity. It documents the history of lynching in the United States and was inspired by Cameron’s visit to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial in Israel.

Picture postcards from the early part of the 20th century, which travelers sent back home, record their appreciation of the public spectacle of lynching. Joanne Martins, an African-American historian, confirms that this grim history is too readily forgotten.

"Highly recommended. . . The film is moving, informative and creatively done. . . Suitable for high school, undergraduate or graduate students."
‒Thomas Beck, University of Colorado for Educational Media Reviews Online