Author Date

2025-08-01

Degree Name

BS

Department

Neuroscience

College

Life Sciences

Defense Date

2025-07-28

Publication Date

2025-08-01

First Faculty Advisor

Dr. Rebecca de Schweinitz

First Faculty Reader

Dr. Christopher Jones

Honors Coordinator

Dr. Peter Leman

Keywords

racial terror lynching, African Americans, migration, remembrance

Abstract

This thesis explores the history of African Americans in Carbon County, Utah, through the lens of racial terror lynching, community memory, and migration. Anchored in the story of Robert Marshall, a Black man lynched in Price, Utah, in 1925, the project considers how racial violence reached beyond the American South and how such acts have been neglected in public memory. Drawing on family history research, census records, historical newspapers, and the work of the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), this work contextualizes Marshall’s death within broader patterns of racial terror lynchings that shaped African American migration from the South during the post-Reconstruction era. The work also highlights the under-documented presence of Black coal miners and families in Carbon County during the early 20th century. While this project does not culminate in a formal commemoration, it lays the foundation for future public history efforts, including soil collection and historical marker placement through EJI’s Community Remembrance Project. In doing so, the thesis argues that remembrance is not only a historical act but a form of justice, urging Utah communities to confront their racial past and create space for healing and truth.

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