Hummel Park

Nebraska · USA · Execution site

A city park on the northern edge of Omaha with a history of racial killings. The story about the bowing trees is folklore. The lynchings are not.

Hummel Park lies on the northern outskirts of Omaha, Nebraska, and the reason it carries the reputation it does is a matter of record rather than legend.

In the early 1900s, lynch mobs operating in and around Omaha murdered Black people, and this park is one of the places associated with that violence. Racial terror in this city is documented history, and it is the only part of this entry that needs no qualification.

What has grown around it is folklore. The trees along the road leading into the park lean over it, and local tradition holds that they bow because of how many people were hanged from them. Trees lean toward light and away from wind, and young trees and grass lean the same way here, on both sides of the boundary, which points to the slope and the road cut rather than to anything else.

Visitors also report figures, mists, drumming at night and animal sounds.

The park should be visited, if at all, as a place where people were murdered for their race, which is what it is.

FAQ

Hvor ligger Hummel Park?

Hummel Park ligger i Nebraska, USA.

Image: vwcampin / CC BY 2.0 via flickr