LSU strips segregationist name from library after board vote
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Louisiana State University stripped the name of a segregationist former president from the campus’s main library Friday, within hours after the school's governing board voted for its removal on the Juneteenth holiday commemorating the emancipation of enslaved black people.
A worker used a crowbar and hammer to strike Troy H. Middleton's name from the building that stands in the center of the Baton Rouge university, in quick action after the unanimous support of the LSU Board of Supervisors. A separate plaque and bust honoring Middleton also were removed from the site to be placed in storage, according to university spokesman Ernie Ballard.
Middleton was LSU president from 1951 until 1962. In news reports and letters from his time as president, the former military general described his belief in racial segregation and said he didn't want black students on campus, but was required to allow them under court order.
“A name on a building is more than a name. It is a symbol. Symbols tell us who the important people are and are not. Symbols reenforce the aspects of the culture that are considered worthy or not. Troy H. Middleton believed black people were not important or worthy,” said Katrina Dunn, president of the LSU A.P. Tureaud Sr. Black Alumni Chapter.
She added: “This is not an erasure of history. It is a reckoning.”
Gov. John Bel Edwards urged the Board of Supervisors to take Middleton's name off the library, saying the state and country need to “confront the ugly realities of the past.”
“In 2020 and going forward, LSU students shouldn’t be studying in a library named after someone who didn’t want them to be LSU students,” the Democratic governor said.
Edwards spoke Friday at the board meeting, which was held through a...