Ocoee, Nov. 2, 1920: from 255 Black residents to 2 (Ocoee, Orange County, Election Day 1920)

SUMMARYOcoee, Nov. 2, 1920: from 255 Black residents to 2 (Ocoee, Orange County, Election Day 1920) [Connections: Tallahassee & Orlando, Nov 5, 2026]

RECORDOn Election Day, Black farmer and voter organizer Mose Norman was turned away at the polls; a white mob, joined by about 200 reinforcements, attacked July Perry's home. Perry, a "prosperous" landowner who paid poll taxes for other Black voters, was taken from custody and lynched; no one was prosecuted. At least 25 Black-owned homes, two churches and a fraternal lodge were burned; about 500 Black residents were driven out; residents of southern Ocoee were pressured to "sell out and leave." Death estimates run from 30 to about 80 (NAACP investigator Walter White: about 30). The 1920 census counted 255 African Americans and 560 whites; the 1930 census counted 1,180 whites, 11 Native Americans and 2 African Americans. No Black residents settled there again until 1981

PATTERNThe census itself records the replacement of a Black community by a white one within ten years

LENS (WW9)"We were replaced" is in the census: 255 to 2

OPENThe 1930 count of "11 Native Americans" in Ocoee is from Wikipedia and should be checked in the census pages; land transfers after 1920 need Orange County deed research (Fussell, "Dead Men Bring No Claims," William & Mary Law Review, 2016)

SOURCEOcoee massacre (Wikipedia), citing Paul Ortiz, Emancipation Betrayed (2005), Walter White's NAACP report, and the 1920/1930 censuses.