Monumental Lies

Reveal

The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX

News

4.7 • 8K Ratings

🗓️ 19 June 2021

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis Police officer last year sparked a wave of social justice protests, including ones targeting monuments that celebrate segregationists, slave-owners, conquistadors and Confederate leaders. Since then, about 160 monuments have come down, but roughly 2,000 remain standing.

We teamed up with Type Investigations to visit dozens of Confederate monuments and found that for devoted followers, they inspire a disturbing – and distorted – view of history: Confederate generals as heroes. Slaves who were happy to work for them. That twisted history is also shared with schoolchildren on class trips. And you won’t believe who’s funding these sites to keep them running.

Then, reporter Stan Alcorn follows the story of New Mexico’s great monument controversy. In 1998, the state was set to celebrate its cuarto centenario: the 400th anniversary of the state’s colonization by the Spanish. But a dramatic act of vandalism would turn the making of a monument in Albuquerque into a fight over history the city didn’t expect.

This show is an update from a 2020 episode that was based on reporting originally broadcast Dec. 8, 2018.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, it's Alan. I hope 2022 has been a good year for you. But to be honest, it's been a tough one for us.
0:08.0	This year, Reveal was struck by a financial crisis that jeopardized our very existence.
0:14.0	But we've rallied, and all the while that was happening, our staff forged ahead to produce ambitious investigations
0:22.0	that exposed corruption and abuses that the powerful interests did not want revealed.
0:27.0	Because that's what we do. If we're going to keep telling these kind of stories though, we're going to need support from you.
0:34.0	To support fearless investigative nonprofit journalism, please donate by December 31st.
0:41.0	Just visit revealnews.org slash 2023. Again, to donate to the show and to support our work into the future.
0:48.0	Please visit revealnews.org slash 2023. And from the bottom of my heart, thank you.
1:01.0	From the Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX, this is reveal. I'm Alexi.
1:07.0	June 19, 1865. A union general arrives in Galveston, Texas. He informs what is believed to be the last group of individuals
1:17.0	who have been in the last group of enslaved black people, some very overdue news. They are now free.
1:24.0	The day came to be known as June Teens. As we celebrate the day this year, we want to look back at something that happened a year ago.
1:34.0	Now June Teens has been celebrated in the US for over 150 years. But organizers here in Richmond say that this year is much different.
1:44.0	People in Richmond, Virginia were meeting in the least likely of places.
1:49.0	People gathered at the Robert E. Lee monument to commemorate a moment in history.
1:55.0	That's right. People gathered at a monument of Confederate General Robert E. Lee.
2:00.0	So tonight there will be a candlelight vigil at 730 this evening here at the Robert E. Lee monument. This will kick off.
2:06.0	This is just one of many statues of segregationists, slave owners, conquistadors, and Confederate soldiers that tower above onlookers in a cultural war over American identity and history.
2:19.0	Roughly 160 Confederate monuments and symbols have come down since protests sparked by the murder of George Floyd. But about 2,000 of those monuments remain.
2:32.0	A few years ago, we teamed up with type investigations to find out who's paying for these monuments and what versions of history are they keeping alive.
2:40.0	Reporters Brian Palmer and Seth Friedwester visited more than 50 Confederate sites, including a Mississippi estate called Beauvoir, home of Confederate President Jefferson Davis.
2:53.0	We revisit that story now with Brian and Seth at the grounds of Beauvoir in 2018 during its annual fall muster. Here's Seth.
	...

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