Basic Information
- Type of Place
- Independent City or Town
- Metro Area
- Politics c. 1860?
- Unions, Organized Labor?
Sundown Town Status
- Sundown Town in the Past?
- Probable
- Was there an ordinance?
- Yes, Strong Oral Tradition
- Sign?
- Don’t Know
- Year of Greatest Interest
- Still Sundown?
- Probably Not, Although Still Very Few Black People
Census Information
| Total | White | Black | Asian | Native | Hispanic | Other | BHshld | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1860 | 1679 | 0 | ||||||
| 1870 | 2448 | 2 | ||||||
| 1880 | 1594 | 0 | ||||||
| 1890 | 1654 | 0 | ||||||
| 1900 | 2104 | 0 | ||||||
| 1910 | ||||||||
| 1920 | ||||||||
| 1930 | 2240 | 0 | ||||||
| 1940 | 2575 | 2 | ||||||
| 1950 | 3214 | 1 | ||||||
| 1960 | 3325 | 0 | ||||||
| 1970 | 3350 | |||||||
| 1980 | ||||||||
| 1990 | 2657 | 2642 | 2 | |||||
| 2000 | 2725 | 2674 | 13 | |||||
| 2010 | ||||||||
| 2020 |
Method of Exclusion
Main Ethnic Group(s)
Group(s) Excluded
- Black
Comments
According to a professor at Carthage College, Carthage was a sundown town as late as the 50’s and 60’s. He stated, “As a matter of fact, in the years I attended Carthage (1955-59) the black students on campus had to have their ID cards in their possession if they ventured into town to see a movie or get a hamburger. Many of the black students at Carthage in those years were foreign students sponsored by the national synod … I do not recall a black face at Carthage High School or in the community. It was an all white school in what I’m sure was an all white city.”
Carthage is most famous for being the site of the 1844 assassination of Joseph Smith.
In Feb., 1863, six Negroes were convicted at Carthage [by Democrats] of living within the state contrary to the black laws and were thereupon sold for their fines to the highest bidder. (Arthur C. Cole, The Era of the Civil War, 1848-1870 (Freeport: Books for Libraries Press, 1971 [1919]), 335.)