In 1889, three Black men established the cooperative People’s Grocery Company in the city of Memphis, which had been Chickasaw homeland for thousands of years before the U.S. forced their removal. White people, allied with business owners incensed by the competition, harassed customers and provoked violence until a confrontation with plainclothes police gave authorities a pretext to arrest the co-op owners.

On this day in 1892, a mob of white people storms the Memphis jail before the prisoners are given a trial. Masked men drag the grocers a mile outside of town, and shoot them dead.

More than 6000 Black residents move away from Memphis. Black journalist Ida B. Wells reports on the story — the start of her national anti-lynching campaign. No one is ever punished for the lynchings.