Allen Brooks

People

Allen Brooks

Outcome

unknown

On March 3, 1910, Allen Brooks, a Black handyman in his late fifties, was lynched by a mob in downtown Dallas, Texas, after being accused of assaulting a three-year-old white girl. The lynching was a "spectacle lynching"—a public act of racial terror witnessed by thousands, photographed, and commemorated with souvenir postcards. Despite attracting a crowd of several thousand and the presence of police, none of the participants were ever prosecuted. The site remained unmarked for 111 years until a memorial marker was placed in 2021. Brooks was born around 1853, likely in Maryland, and was probably born into slavery. He worked as a house cleaner and laborer in Freedmanstown, a Black neighborhood in Dallas, and raised nine children with his wife Milly. On February 24, 1910, Brooks was accused of assaulting three-year-old Mary Ethel Buvens, a white child from a family he worked for. Brooks denied the allegations. Fearing mob violence, authorities moved Brooks to Sherman, Texas, 65 miles away, while newspapers including the Dallas Times Herald and Morning News kept attention on the sensational case. Dallas County Sheriff Arthur Ledbetter creatively concealed Brooks's whereabouts to prevent mob action. On the morning of March 3, Brooks was brought to Dallas on a 5 a.m. interurban car and hurried to the courthouse by Sheriff Ledbetter and former sheriff Ben E. Cabell. A crowd of several hundred assembled outside, quickly growing to over 1,000 inside the building. When Brooks's defense attorneys requested a continuance, rumors spread that a change of venue would occur. Around 11:15 a.m., the mob—fighting past 70-150 law enforcement officers who made no effort to use their guns—seized Brooks on the second floor of the courthouse, tied a rope around his neck, and pulled him out a window. Brooks landed on his head on the street below, where the mob kicked and stomped him until his face was "crushed into a pulp." Though unconscious, Brooks was dragged by car to Elks Arch at Main Street and Akard Street, where he was hanged from a telephone pole or iron spike beneath the arch. The crowd at Elks Arch swelled to an estimated 5,000-6,000 people. In a characteristic feature of spectacle lynchings, people carved pieces from the telephone pole and took pieces of Brooks's clothing as souvenirs. Photographs were taken and turned into souvenir postcards. Many local newspapers defended the mob's actions as "carrying out justice." A grand jury investigation never named any members of the mob; the police officers charged with protecting Brooks refused to identify any participants. No one was ever prosecuted. In 2021, the Dallas County Justice Initiative, in partnership with the Equal Justice Initiative, erected a historical marker at Pegasus Plaza at the corner of Akard and Main Streets—Dallas's first permanent, public recognition of the city's history of racial violence. In 2023, a Texas historical marker was installed at the former Dallas courthouse.