Mount Zion African Methodist Episcopal Church, a prominent African-American church in Greeleyville, S.C., caught fire late Tuesday. It is the eighth black church in the Southern U.S. to burn in 10 days.
Greeleyville, about 60 miles northwest of Charleston, S.C., has seen similar fires before, the Charleston Post and Courier reports. Mount Zion was burned to the ground by the KKK in 1995, part of a string of 30 fires in black churches that spanned two years.
An investigation into the fire’s cause will begin after it is safely extinguished, chief of the South Carolina State Law Enforcement Division Mark Keel told the Post and Courier. He noted that the thunderstorm that pounded the town of 375 on Tuesday evening could have ignited the church. Meteorologist Pete Mohlin of the National Weather Service told the paper that there was a lot of lightning in the area around 7 p.m., but he could not say if it had caused the fire.
Parishioners across the South are surveying the damage that a string of similar fires has caused this week, the Southern Poverty Law Center reports, starting in Knoxville, Tenn., on June 21 and moving to Macon, Ga., and Gibson County, in Tennessee, on June 23; Charlotte, N.C., on June 24; Elyria, Ohio, on June 25; and Tallahassee, Fla., and Warrenville, S.C., on June 26.
Three of those fires have been ruled arson, one was determined to be caused by a falling branch and faulty wiring, and the others remain under investigation. Several have been blamed preliminarily on lightning; weather in the South this week has been turbulent.
State senator Cezar McKnight was on the scene as the fire continued to burn at 10 p.m. “South Carolina has been through a lot the last two weeks, and we’ve made the best of a terrible situation,” he said. “I would hate for this to be something somebody did on purpose to try to poison the love and fellowship.”
The Post and Courier recalled that then President Bill Clinton visited Mount Zion after it was rebuilt following the 1995 attack. His remarks at its dedication have resonance still:
“The men and women of Mount Zion have shown us the meaning of these words by refusing to be defeated and by building up this new church. Others have come together with you,” Clinton said on June 12, 1996. “The pastor told me he got contributions from all over the world to help to rebuild this church. In just a few days we’ll have a joyful noise coming out of this church … I want to ask every citizen, as we stand on this hallowed ground together, to help to rebuild our churches, to restore hope, to show the forces of hatred they cannot win.”
On Aug. 9, 2014, unarmed teenager Michael Brown was fatally shot by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson. This image provided by KMOV-TV shows investigators inspecting Brown's body.Tiffany Mitchell—APLesley McSpadden, Brown's mother, is comforted by her husband, Louis Head, on Aug. 9, 2014, after her son's deathHuy Mach—St. Louis Post-Dispatch/APA fire burns at a QuikTrip store in Ferguson on Aug. 10, 2014, as protests turned violent one day after Brown's death. The night marked the first violent turn for the protests.David Carson—St. Louis Post-Dispatch/APHeavily-armed police advance on a protester on Aug. 11, 2014. Law enforcement's tactical response, which included military-grade weapons, tanks and SWAT teams, touched off a debate over the militarization of local police forces.Whitney Curtis—The New York Times/ReduxA protester takes shelter from billowing smoke during demonstrations in Ferguson on Aug. 13, 2014. Such scenes were relatively common during the first week of protests.David Carson—St. Louis Post-Dispatch/APA demonstrator throws back a tear gas container after tactical officers worked to break up a group of bystanders on Chambers Road near West Florissant in Ferguson on Aug. 13, 2014. Robert Cohen—St. Louis Post-Dispatch/MCT/Zuma PressCaptain Ron Johnson of the Missouri Highway Patrol addresses the media in Ferguson on Aug. 15, 2014. Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon appointed NIxon to coordinate law enforcement's response after local departments were criticized for fanning the flames.Lucas Jackson—ReutersDarren Wilson at a Ferguson city council meeting on Feb. 11, 2014. The image was the first widely-circulated photo of Wilson after the shooting.City of Ferguson/APTear gas rains down on a woman kneeling in the street with her hands in the air during a demonstration in Ferguson on Aug. 17, 2014. The "hands up, don't shoot" pose became the defining gesture of the protests.Scott Olson—Getty ImagesPolice in Ferguson fire tear gas in the direction of bottle-throwing crowds on Aug. 18, 2014.David Carson—St Louis Post-Dispatch / PolarisLaw enforcement officers look on during a protest on West Florissant Avenue in Ferguson on Aug. 18, 2014.Michael B. Thomas—AFP/Getty ImagesU.S. Attorney General Eric Holder appeared with Capt. Ron Johnson at Drake's Place Restaurant in Ferguson on Aug. 20, 2014. Holder's visit was meant to calm tensions after almost 10 days of protests.Pablo Martinez Monsivais—Pool/Getty ImagesAn anguished Michael Brown, Sr. yells as his son's casket is lowered into the ground at St. Peter's Cemetery in St. Louis, Mo., on Aug. 25, 2014. Richard Perry—ReutersMembers of the Ferguson Police Department wear body cameras during a rally on Aug. 30, 2014, in Ferguson. Like a number of departments around the U.S., Ferguson police began using the wearable cameras after Michael Brown was killed. There are no video recordings of the incident involving Brown and officer Darren Wilson.Aaron P. Bernstein—Getty ImagesA fire on Sept. 23, 2014 burned a memorial for Michael Brown on the site where he was killed. The memorial was later rebuilt.Jacob Crawford—APFerguson Police Chief Tom Jackson, left, addresses protesters in front of the Ferguson Police Department, on Sept. 25, 2014. Protesters have called for Jackson to resign.Robert Cohen—St. Louis Post-Dispatch/APDemonstrators participate at a rally on the campus of St. Louis University on Oct. 13, 2014. Citizens around St. Louis continued to demonstrate throughout October, including during a performance by the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and at a St. Louis Cardinals baseball game.Scott Olson—Getty ImagesAcademic Cornel West is taken into custody after performing an act of civil disobedience at the Ferguson, Mo., police station on Oct. 13, 2014.Charles Rex Arbogast—APLesley McSpadden, Michael Brown's mother, attends a press conference addressing the U.N. Committee Against Torture, in Geneva, Switzerland, on Nov. 12, 2014. Brown's parents testified in front of the committee about their son's death.Martial Trezzini—EPAAfter the announcement that the grand jury brought no charges against Darren Wilson, police officers and protesters faced off on a tense night in which cars and buildings were burned by protesters and tear gas thrown by police, in Ferguson, Mo. on Nov. 24, 2014.Jim Young—ReutersOn March 4, 2015, the U.S. Department of Justice released two reports clearing Officer Wilson of any civil rights violations when he shot and killed Brown but found a pattern of explicit racism and unfair treatment of minorities by Ferguson police officers and local officials.Carolyn Kaster—APFerguson Police Chief Tom Jackson stepped down March 11, 2015, after a federal report harshly criticized the police department, becoming the sixth Ferguson official to resign since the investigation.
Scott Olson—Getty ImagesTwo police officers were shot outside the Ferguson Police Department March 12, 2015, during a demonstration that followed the resignation of the agency’s embattled police chief. The two officers—one from Webster Groves, Mo., the other from St. Louis County—were seriously injured.Lawrence Bryant—St. Louis American/Reuters
