In recent decades, scholars have explored much of the history of mob violence in the American South, especially in the years after Reconstruction. However, the lynching violence that occurred in American regions outside the South, where hundreds of persons, including Hispanics, whites, African Americans, Native Americans, and Asian Americans died at the hands of lynch mobs, has received less attention. This collection of essays by prominent and rising scholars fills this gap by illuminating the factors that distinguished lynching in the West, the Midwest, and the Mid-Atlantic. The volume adds to a more comprehensive history of American lynching and will be of interest to all readers interested in the history of violence across the varied regions of the United States.

 

Contributors are Jack S. Blocker Jr., Brent M. S. Campney, William D. Carrigan, Sundiata Keita Cha-Jua, Dennis B. Downey, Larry R. Gerlach, Kimberley Mangun, Helen McLure, Michael J. Pfeifer, Christopher Waldrep, Clive Webb, and Dena Lynn Winslow.

Michael J. Pfeifer is an associate professor of history at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY, and at the CUNY Graduate Center and the author of Rough Justice: Lynching and American Society, 1874-1947 and The Roots of Rough Justice: Origins of American Lynching.

"The essays collected in this volume remind us, no region of the country--and no ethnic group--was spared the spectacle of lynch mobs in the 19th or early-20th centuries."--Shepherd Express

“Each essay expands understanding of lynching and shows how deeply the practice was embedded in the cultural DNA of the nation. . . . Thought-provoking and impressively researched.”--The Journal of American History

"A must read for all historians who work on lynching and mob violence in American history."
--Manfred Berg, author of Popular Justice: A History of Lynching in America

 
"These perceptive case studies underscore Pfeifer's contention that lynching was a national phenomenon that disrupted the transition from 'rough justice' to 'due process.'--The Journal of Arizona History