Alison Stewart: This is All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. The weekend after election day, 2024, will mark the 126 years since a successful coup in American history. In the early 1890s, Wilmington, North Carolina, was a city where Black residents could prosper, own businesses, and sat in elected government positions, but in 1898, a white supremacist mob took to the streets, killing an unknown number of residents. Estimates range from dozens to hundreds. The number of deaths is unknown, in part because the insurrectionists were successful in their aim to take control of the local government and wrest control of the narrative.

A new documentary titled American Coup: Wilmington 1898 seeks to restore the truth of the events of that day. Here's a clip featuring historians and descendants describing the violence.

Speaker 1: 2,000 people start going through the streets, stepping over or around these bodies. Many of them go to Pine Forest Cemetery, which is the Black cemetery, on the assumption that maybe the white gunmen wouldn't go there. They go into the swamps and into the forests, any place they can hide from the white gunmen. A sunny, mild day had suddenly turned into a gray, rainy, cold day. They didn't have enough time to bring blankets or heavy coats because earlier in the day, it had been mild, so they're completely exposed to the elements in a driving, cold November rain, huddled.

Speaker 2: Felice Sajwar, who was one of the Sajwar sisters. She remembers being young and held in the rushes of the Cape Fear River, hiding out that night, that November 10th.

Speaker 1: Her father had to hold her mouth down from screaming, as dead bodies passed them through the water.

Speaker 3: Think about that. You're running for safety into a swamp because it's safer in a swamp than it is in your home.

Alison Stewart: American Coup will air on PBS on November 12th. Co-director, Yoruba Richen in the studio with me. Hi. Nice to see you.

Yoruba Richen: Hi.

Alison Stewart: Brad Lichtenstein is here with me now. Hi, Brad.

Brad Lichtenstein: Hello. Thanks for having us.

Alison Stewart: Sure, so, Yoruba, this history has been told in print before. David Zucchino, one of the speakers in your documentary, was on our show for his excellent book, Wilmington's Lie. What did you want to add to the record by making this documentary?

Yoruba Richen: Yes. Thank you so much for having us.

Alison Stewart: Sure.

Yoruba Richen: We felt that this story was a story that was so vital to our understanding of this country and of democracy and of the-- one of many events that happened in this country that really stole Black generational wealth, so many different elements of it, and Zucchino's book was great. It was so amazing to have it, to start with, and to have him be a part of our team and our advisors. We also knew that by making a film, bringing it visually, telling the story visually, having-- hearing people not only telling the story but also the effects of the story, so we also have descendants of both the Black and white perpetrators as part of the story.

We knew that we wanted that to be an important part because this is not just history. This is the way in which the descendants, again, both Black and white, are still grappling with this history.

Alison Stewart: Brad, this moment in history has been given a lot of names. It's been called "a massacre," "an insurrection." Earlier descriptions referred to it, very problematically, as a "race riot." Your documentary is titled, "American Coup." Why did you want to use that word, "coup?"

Brad Lichtenstein: Thanks for asking that question. I think it's important, first of all, to note you're exactly right, that, for years, it was called "a race riot," which implies that, somehow, Black people in Wilmington were responsible, and they weren't. I'm glad that that's been corrected. "Coup" is important, I think, because it wasn't just a massacre. It was a very orchestrated planned overthrow of a sitting multiracial government. It was planned weeks and months in advance.

It depended on misinformation, disinformation campaigns. It depended on whipping white people into anger and frenzy around tropes that were stereotypes of Black men raping white women. It played onto the worst of our fears in order to get people to support this coup and, eventually, a massacre. By bringing attention to the "coup" part of it, which is maybe lesser known, was really important to us.

Alison Stewart: Yoruba, your documentary traces the story back to the Civil War, back to the Reconstruction period. What are the most important things to understand about the city of Wilmington in the decades after the Civil War?

Yoruba Richen: Reconstruction is a time period that's probably one of the most underexamined, at least in terms of mainstream media, part of our history, which actually tells us so much about our present. It's so important, which-- Again, I did not know this before embarking on this journey of making the film, that Wilmington was a very vibrant Black majority community that was-- It's a port city. It had many vibrant, Black businesses who not only were serving their own community but were also serving the white community, and they also traded with each other.

That was another very important element and also what was so threatening to the white supremists who overthrew the government. Also, too, though, it wasn't-- you know, it's not like it was a perfect interracial utopia. Blacks and whites did have some measure of living amongst each other, of-- There were Black and white relationships, romantic relationships and marriages. It was doing-- and it also-- Whereas, Reconstruction is considered kind of done by the 1870, 1880s, Wilmington was still sort of living the dream of Reconstruction.

It's important to understand that because then you understand what was threatening and what was enraging to the white supremists, as they called themselves, who planned and undertook the coup and massacre.

Alison Stewart: Yes, they call themselves that. That's not a name we're giving them.

Yoruba Richen: Absolutely.

Alison Stewart: Brad, in the documentary, you point out that Wilmington's government before the coup was a Fusionist government. It was Black and some poor whites. The historian, Robin DG Kelley, says it's not the Black majority Black, it's the majority Fusion that makes a difference. Would you describe what this Fusion government was like and why it was threatening to the white supremacists?

Brad Lichtenstein: Sure. Well, as you point out, it was a group of people who came together in a populist movement that was primarily motivated by economics. You had a lot of farmers, who were mostly white, who felt like they were losing money, losing income due to Depression and due to the white oligarchs who were in many parts of the south, in charge, or reclaiming power. It was a movement that joined recently freed or this next generation of Black people, post-slavery, during Reconstruction, with this largely agrarian and industrial, to some degree, movement that became Fusion, that became this kind of phenomenon.

It wasn't an official party like the Democrats, but it was a movement that brought people together. Of course, it wasn't the first time, nor would it be the last time, that Black and white interests coincided, particularly around economic interest, and that white supremacy and racism would destroy that.

Alison Stewart: Why did the white supremacists, Yoruba, why did they fight it?

Brad Lichtenstein: Well, it was a threat to the oligarchy, as Brad just described, a threat to the powers that be, the ones, the industrialists, the ones who had the money. It's, again, something that, as Brad just said too, it wasn't the first time, it wasn't the last time we see this. When we see these coalitions being built, of working class, multiracial communities, is when we often see the most opposition from the ruling class. That's certainly what we saw in Wilmington.

Alison Stewart: I'm speaking with Yoruba Richen and Brad Lichtenstein, directors of the new documentary, American Coup: Wilmington 1898, about the white supremacist massacre in North Carolina in the late 19th century. It airs on PBS on November 12. A group is formed, Brad, by the white supremacists, that oppose the Fusion government. They call themselves the Secret Nine. Who were they? What were their goals?

Brad Lichtenstein: Sure. Well, the Secret Nine, as one of the people we interviewed in the film set, is kind of a fancy way to say, "The Chamber of Commerce."

Alison Stewart: Right.

Brad Lichtenstein: The Secret Nine are basically a group of white men, business leaders in Wilmington, who were orchestrating the coup, who did things like wrote what was called "A white Declaration of Independence," which was a document that said specific things like, "Alex Manley, the editor of the Black newspaper, had to be banished," but also said more general things like that the white race was superior to the Black race and that "white people should never be ruled by Black people."

Alison Stewart: Let's bring another person in here. I hope I say this name right. Josephus Daniels.

Yoruba Richen: Josephus Daniels.

Alison Stewart: Josephus Daniels.

Brad Lichtenstein: Sure.

Alison Stewart: He was in a group called "The Red Shirts." Yoruba, who were the Red Shirts, and what role did they play heading up to November 10th, the day of the coup?

Yoruba Richen: Well, Josephus was not in the Red Shirts. He was the editor of the paper, which was a very important part of the misinformation that was being spread. The Red Shirts were the, as one of our contributor says, "They were the shock troops." They were the ones that were sent on the streets to actually intimidate and eventually drive out the-- intimidate the Black voters and drive them out, and the massacre, to do the massacre. They were the shock troops. They were the ones on the ground. The Secret Nine were the elite, the businesses that also funded the coup, and the Red Shirts were the ones that were on the ground making this happen.

Alison Stewart: Brad, if you go to Josephus Daniels' Wikipedia page, you'll find him described as, "An American diplomat and newspaper editor," and if you keep scrolling down a bit, you'll find a sentence mentioning being the leader of the coup.

Brad Lichtenstein: [laughs]

Alison Stewart: During your research, how often did you find examples of this, individuals involved in this huge massacre, who it just becomes a footnote, it just gets thrown off?

Brad Lichtenstein: Every day. Every day. Many of the people who orchestrated the coup and massacre were rewarded, either directly because of their "victory" in successfully banishing and murdering Black people in Wilmington and overthrowing the government or just in the course of this being part of their careers, so to speak. In the case of Josephus Daniels, he goes on to become a diplomat, as you pointed out, ambassador to Mexico and Secretary of the Navy.

Yoruba Richen: Under Roosevelt.

Alison Stewart: Wow.

Brad Lichtenstein: Under Roosevelt. He was literally at the top of the disinformation campaign, by running The News and Observer, which was the most read newspaper. I think it's, for folks today, it's as if he was running Twitter or Instagram or some other social media site. Daily, he was constantly plugging the white supremacist propaganda and trying to excite the crowds into fear by running cartoons that talked about how Negro rule "was going to take away all the power from white families and white men," or that Black men were threatening to rape white women and calling men to duty to protect their women. This was a refrain that was just constantly beat into the populace, day after day, through the newspaper.

Alison Stewart: Yes, it was kind of interesting. They had to give them a reason for it. "You're protecting our women." That was a big thing.

Yoruba Richen: Absolutely. Alexander Manley was the publisher of the-- what, at that point, was one of the-- if not the only Black newspaper that was published daily, The Daily Record. Alexander Manley had the courage to stand up to this and responded in a editorial that this was not true, that this was misinformation, that, in fact, not only that, that, in fact, Black men and white women have-- there are many circumstances where they are in consensual relationships, and that white men had, in fact, been raping Black women for many--

Alison Stewart: Years.

Yoruba Richen: Yes, and no one talked about that, and that, as he says, "We will not let these lies persist," basically. That was a reason that the Secret Nine and the white supremacists used to say, "Okay, we got to look at what this Manley wrote. We have got to move in, overthrow the government. This is it," and use that as the sort of "reason," that this all-- as the motivating force that this had to take place.

Alison Stewart: We're discussing the documentary, American Coup: Wilmington 1898. We'll have more after a quick break. This is All Of It.

[MUSIC - WNYC: Theme Music]

Alison Stewart: You are listening to All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. I'm speaking with Yoruba Richen and Brad Lichtenstein, directors of the new documentary, American Coup: Wilmington 1898, about the white supremacy massacre in North Carolina in the late 19th century. It airs on PBS on November 12. Let's talk about the 9th and 10th of November. On November 9th, a mob of white men and boys went to The Daily Record, looking for Alex Manley, and they burned down the building.

Yoruba Richen: That's right.

Alison Stewart: What is striking to you about these photos? Yoruba?

Yoruba Richen: Well, what's striking is that-- and we should also say, Alex Manley had escaped beforehand.

Alison Stewart: Right.

Yoruba Richen: He was able to survive. What's striking about these photos is that these are some of the only photos from the massacre and coup. It's not like they were going around documenting what they were doing, but this, they wanted to document. Again, as one of our contributors says in the film, "It's so reminiscent of the lynching photos that we see from this time and up until the 1920s and '30s and '40s of the pride that was taken in what they did." It wasn't hidden. They weren't ashamed of it. That's what is, to me, is so striking about these photos.

Alison Stewart: Let's play another clip from American Coup: Wilmington 1898. This shares a story about the killing of a man named Josh Halsey.

Speaker 4: At a place called Manhattan park, which was a community center where special events would happen, a dance hall.

Speaker 5: In their mind, it was a place where Black troublemakers went to get drunk and cause trouble, so they shot it, shot up the clapboard fence that is around, and went inside, and this man named Josh Halsey panics and bolts, runs away. They fire at him. They don't hit him. He makes it back to his home.

Speaker 4: Because Halsey lived just around the corner, his family was in proximity to all of this violence.

Elaine Brown: My name is Elaine Brown. I'm Joshua Halsey's second great-granddaughter. One of his daughters came running through to warn him that the militia was coming, so when they entered the home, Joshua runs out the back way, running for his life. He's coming out. Joshua took 14 shots to the back up ahead.

Alison Stewart: Brad, this murder stands out among all the violence of these days. Would you share what Halsey's family had been through, and what does it illustrate about the motivations behind the white mobs?

Brad Lichtenstein: Sure, and, just to start out, I mean, I met the Halsey family at our very first shoot.

Alison Stewart: Oh, wow.

Brad Lichtenstein: When I was meeting the Halsey family, many of the Halsey family were meeting each other for the first time because one of the impacts of their ancestor being murdered and, consequently, the loss of wealth and the disbursement of the family is that it wasn't really until a man named Tim Pinnock in Wilmington started to use genetic research to start finding different members of victims of the coup and massacre. It was very powerful to meet them for the first time.

It's interesting, we include a little snippet of the fact that Joshua Halsey's family had sued the city of Wilmington right around that time. There's some evidence that, perhaps, he, of the many people who were killed that day, may have been targeted. Part of that evidence comes from minutes of a meeting that took place of some of the "veterans" of the massacre, who were bragging, essentially, about what they did.

They recount a deliberate calling out Joshua Halsey's name, chasing him down, and murdering him. What you have is, essentially, something that may have well been an assassination of sorts, amid all of the chaos and violence that was going on.

Yoruba Richen: I just want to emphasize, too, the importance of understanding that the wealth of this community, of the Black community, was what was threatening, or a big part of what was threatening. There are other circumstances where-- We know that one of the perpetrators of the coup had lost a job to a Black man, and it was a job that made-- was pretty substantial, in terms of income. There's all these-- As you look at the record and you see what was destroyed, Black men who own businesses, who own banks, that was what was threatening to the white supremacists.

Alison Stewart: It makes you-- It reminds you of Tulsa.

Yoruba Richen: Absolutely.

Brad Lichtenstein: Absolutely.

Yoruba Richen: With a political element to it.

Alison Stewart: I want to play another clip from the documentary, which describes after the violence began to die down a little bit, how a transfer of power actually took place. This is from American Coup: Wilmington 1898.

Speaker 6: By mid-afternoon on November 10th, the shooting had started to die down because so many people had fled. Waddell and the other leaders of the conspiracy turned to actually taking over the city government. They met at Thalian Hall, and all these gunmen from the streets course in there, in just a high state of rage and anticipation. They call the sitting government in, the mayor, the police chief, the aldermen, and, at gunpoint, they tell them that there is a white revolution, their jobs no longer exist, and they have to resign. Then the mob leaders installed Waddell as mayor. They replaced the police chief with a former Confederate officer.

Speaker 7: Following the rule of law that said, "If a member of the board of aldermen resigns his seat, the existing board then votes to fill the vacancy. Waddell conveniently had a list of pre-approved white supremacy candidates for the board of aldermen seats for each precinct. One by one, members of the board of aldermen resigned their seats, and, one by one, new people were put in place.

Alison Stewart: Brad, on one hand, he had a violent, chaotic day, people spurred on by their emotions. On the other hand, well, the additional hand, I should say, it's a methodical seizing of power.

Brad Lichtenstein: That's ight.

Alison Stewart: How planned out was this coup?

Brad Lichtenstein: It was completely planned out. The Secret Nine, with one of the people who did a lot of their dirty work for them, Alfred Waddell, laid out a plan and understood what the rule of law required in order to make sure that there was not going to be a challenge to the coup. Part of it was what you just heard, the forced resignations. Remember, too, this is after the Black population in Wilmington had appealed to the president, McKinley, to the governor, and were not getting any support. It was not only planned out, but it was the kind of thing that people could see happening to them in slow motion and not get any help to stop it.

Alison Stewart: Right. We saw so many of the Black citizens, they left Wilmington. They didn't talk about it. Nobody talked about it. It was really interesting in your documentary, Yoruba, that you talked to the great-great-grandchildren of these residents and the Black residents, even some of the children of the great-grandchildren of the white supremacists. Why did you want to have them featured so widely in the doc?

Yoruba Richen: Yes, that was always a part that we knew was so important to include, and not just the descendants of the Black victims but also of the white perpetrators. Brad and I worked really hard to get those voices to come forward and share what was their understanding of what happened. What were the stories that they were told? I don't think until we understand that about from the descendants of perpetrators will we really be able to reckon with this history.

Again, it's not just Wilmington. We are so grateful that they shared their stories with us and are working with us, not only on these screenings but also, too, on impacted education around that we have planned for this film around the country with PBS North Carolina, which are the producers of the film. So important.

Alison Stewart: Brad, have you gotten any feedback, positive or negative, from people from North Carolina, some people who think, "I just want that to go away."?

Brad Lichtenstein: Well, interesting question. We've only had one screening so far. We just had our premiere last Monday, and that crowd was at Hot Springs Documentary Festival, which is a prominent documentary film festival. We definitely got a lot of positive feedback. People were, you know, very enwrapped with the film, even laughed a couple times, which we were glad, there's a little bit of levity, and, of course, were very moved.

Some of the people in that audience were from North Carolina, so people came up to us. By and large, what I hear is that "We didn't know the story." or that "We knew very little about it," which is understandable because it was so deliberately erased, so no shame in not knowing.

Alison Stewart: Yes. The name of the documentary is American Coup: Wilmington 1898. I've been speaking with its co-directors, Yoruba Richen and Brad Lichtenstein. Thank you so much for being in the studio, Yoruba.

Yoruba Richen: Thank you.

Alison Stewart: Thank you so much, Brad.

Yoruba Richen: Thank you for having us.

Brad Lichtenstein: Oh, thank you. We really appreciate it.

[MUSIC - WNYC: Theme Music]

Alison Stewart: Tomorrow, actor Kenneth Branagh will be here in the studio. He plays the title role in the new production of King Lear at The Shed. He's directing it as well. I'm Alison Stewart. I appreciate you listening, and I appreciate you. I will meet you back here tomorrow.