Oral History Interview with Raymond Clement, July 6, 1983 Page: 9
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Clement
9
established about six miles outside of town. Then sup-
posedly one of the blacks assaulted a white girl. In the
process, the white community moved in, hung the black person,
burned the school house, and gave the others an ultimatum to
be out of town by a certain time, which they didn't use all
that time. They were out sooner. We still have a place
where the young kids go. They don't know the story behind
it, but they've got what is called "Hangman's Tree." They
just know it's "Hangman's Tree." They don't know that it
goes all the way back to the turn of the century where this
black man was hung there.
So I was from...I can't say it was a racist community because
we never saw black people to be racist. But yet, if you
bring a black in, then immediately it becomes a racist com-
munity. But people didn't go around talking about blacks.
They didn't talk about "niggers" then per se because there
wasn't any. But the whole town...after I got back and had
played with blacks and made real good friends with some blacks,
then I could sit back and really feel how bad the town was.
My old granddad ran a trade barn. He was a cattle trader,
and I helped him a lot on Saturdays and Sundays and after
football workouts. Because we lived so far out in the country,
I had to stay with Grandma in town, and that's another thing
that Daddy didn't like. So I can still remember, oh, I guess,
when I was seventh or eighth grade. Somebody came through
town, and they said, "There was a robbery last night." Old
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Marcello, Ronald E. & Clement, Raymond. Oral History Interview with Raymond Clement, July 6, 1983, book, July 6, 1983; Denton, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth223649/m1/11/?q=%22%22~1&rotate=270: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Oral History Program.