Signs of sundown

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From at least the 1920s and into the 1960s, the old Palace Cafe served meals in Ashland. It’s “All White Help” sign documents a time in Southern Oregon when prejudice was blatantly displayed.Terry Skibby collection

What's the story on the "sundown laws?" asks a reader.

It's a question that comes up often, but seldom has a definitive answer.

Basically the "laws" said minorities could not stay in Jackson County overnight, and although they were associated with all non-Caucasian ethnic groups, most often the laws meant no African-Americans.

"They'd tell 'em to get out before night come," Butte Falls resident, Bill Edmondson, remembered in 1990.

Even though people will tell you the laws were on the books of every city in the county, no researcher has ever been able to prove that.

"I have never been able to find a written sundown law," Darrell Millner, professor of black studies at Portland State University told the Mail Tribune a few years ago. "I'm still looking, but I haven't found any."

But even so, Millner and other history experts believe many Oregon communities did post these "unofficial" signs, and that not finding these laws doesn't mean they didn't exist, at least informally. Too many people who were there remember "get out of town" signs — posted on telephone poles, alongside highways and at city limits throughout the valley — to ever doubt they existed.

Edmondson remembered the early 1920s in Jackson County, when the Ku Klux Klan was gaining members and spreading hate against blacks.

"They was kinda ornery about them," he said. "They didn't want blacks there. I remember one time they burnt one of them crosses, on Roxy Ann."

Memories are not necessarily proof and physical evidence of intentional discrimination is seldom something someone keeps or photographs.

There are a couple of photos of white-sheeted Klan members parading in 1920s Ashland, and World War II news stories about the "knotty problem" of entertaining "colored soldiers" stationed at Camp White. But, for the most part, racial prejudice is seldom an open topic for discussion.

Even today we occasionally see stories of racial hatred in the newspaper.

A few weeks ago, a reader in Jacksonville sent a photograph of a cafe in Ashland, and judging by the automobiles found in the photo, it was probably taken in the early to mid 1930s. Although many might think it came from somewhere in the deep South, this photograph documents an earlier time in Southern Oregon, when prejudice was blatantly displayed.

The large neon sign over the front entrance proudly welcomed customers to the "Palace Cafe." It could have also said the "best food in town," but instead it bragged of "All White Help."

The old cafe lasted into the 1960s, situated across from the Varsity Theater on East Main Street. The "White Help" sign was long gone by then.

It's important to note that this is NOT the Palace Cafe that recently opened on A Street in Ashland. Today, the old restaurant site is home to a CPA firm.

Looking at the past isn't always pleasant. Sometimes you find things you'd rather sweep under the rug, but that would be wrong.

If we can't honestly remember who we were, how can we ever be sure of what we'll become?

Writer Bill Miller lives in Shady Cove. Reach him at newsmiller@yahoo.com.

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