Basic Information
- Type of Place
- Independent City or Town
- Metro Area
- Ozarks
- Politics c. 1860?
- Don’t Know
- Unions, Organized Labor?
- Don’t Know
Sundown Town Status
- Sundown Town in the Past?
- Probable
- Was there an ordinance?
- Don't Know
- Sign?
- Don’t Know
- Year of Greatest Interest
- 1901
- Still Sundown?
- Probably
Census Information
| Total | White | Black | Asian | Native | Hispanic | Other | BHshld | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1860 | ||||||||
| 1870 | ||||||||
| 1880 | ||||||||
| 1890 | ||||||||
| 1900 | ||||||||
| 1910 | ||||||||
| 1920 | ||||||||
| 1930 | 1135 | 0 | ||||||
| 1940 | ||||||||
| 1950 | ||||||||
| 1960 | 1006 | 1 | ||||||
| 1970 | ||||||||
| 1980 | ||||||||
| 1990 | 1376 | 1 | ||||||
| 2000 | 1385 | 3 | ||||||
| 2010 | ||||||||
| 2020 |
Method of Exclusion
- Unknown
Main Ethnic Group(s)
- Unknown
Group(s) Excluded
- Black
Comments
Five-hour race riot chased all 200 blacks from Pierce City. They looted the armory and shot hundreds of rounds into the houses with Springfield rifles, killed two blacks in their houses. Blacks wouldn’t leave, were shooting back, but got outgunned by the Springfield rifles. Mob burned the five houses nearest the railroad. The black population ran for it at 2AM.
Pierce City, MO. “Though the black population was small (approximately 30 families), every one was chased out of town with bullets whistling past their ears.” “In this small community of less than 3,000, an estimated 1,000 whites gathered for the lynching [of one black man accused of murdering a white girl] and the burning of the black quarter.” “Following this event, most towns in this small rural county established . . . sundown rules.” “Interviews have confirmed the unwritten law existed and was vigorously enforced.”
In Pierce City, Mo., 1,000 armed whites burned down five black owned houses and killed four blacks on Aug. 18, 1901. Within four days, all of the town’s 129 blacks had fled, never to return, according to a contemporary report in The Lawrence Chieftain newspaper. The AP documented the cases of nine Pierce City blacks who lost a total of 30 acres of farmland and 10 city lots. Whites bought it all at bargain prices. Eviline Brinson, whose house was burned down by the mob, sold her lot for $25 to a white woman after the attack. Brinson had paid $96 for the empty lot in 1889, county records show.
[Gregg Andrews, City of Dust (Columbia: U MO P, 1996), 10-11.]