Lynching of Dick Robinson & Thompson

de bene esse: literally, of well-being, morally acceptable but subject to future validation or exception

Unknown photographer, 1906, Lynching of Dick Robinson & Thompson, Alabama

For over a decade, James Allen collected postcards and photographs of lynching in America “from witnesses, or their relatives and close descendants… These shameful but telling images of a recent episode in the United States’ past… [provide a] careful, scholarly presentation of the material.”

They document that “these horrible events were not only photographed, but that the resultant images were published as postcards and hoarded as morbid souvenirs. Most of the photographers who made them were not dispassionately documenting, but celebrating and ritualizing the murder of American citizens by their fellow Americans.” (Parr & Badger II:230)

Read an interesting article about James Allen here.