Murrysville resident examines 1920s Johnstown racial incident in new book
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Editor’s note: The author’s scheduled March 18 presentation at CCAC was canceled after this story was first published online.
What began as a search for a story about local black history led Cody McDevitt to a project that has gone from a newspaper series to a magazine to a book about the persecution and banishment of black residents and immigrants from Johnstown in the 1920s.
McDevitt’s book, “Banished from Johnstown: Racist Backlash in Pennsylvania,” details the aftermath of the fatal shooting of four police officers in Johnstown.
After the shootings, the mayor at the time ordered every black resident and Mexican immigrant who had been in the town less than seven years to leave or face crippling fines or jail time.
“To be honest, I don’t really think anyone knew about it,” said McDevitt, a Murrysville resident and adjunct journalism instructor at the Community College of Allegheny County. “Most people in the white community had no idea. A few people in the black community knew, but it was a story that was virtually lost.”
The story initially began as a series for the Somerset Daily American, where McDevitt is a reporter. Before long, it was expanded into a magazine, book and now a series of presentations. One was scheduled to take place March 18 at CCAC’s Allegheny campus, but has been canceled along with all activities.
According to the Officer Down Memorial Page nonprofit website, Det. Otto Nukem, along with Special Officer Joseph Abrahams, Det. John James and Capt. Otto Fink, all died from gunshot wounds sustained while responding to a report of a disturbance involving several men in the city’s Rosedale neighborhood.
McDevitt spent five years researching the events of 1923, and said he isn’t finished.
“I’m hoping there are more oral histories to recover,” he said. “I started a Facebook page, ‘The Rosedale Oral History Project,’ which now has 38,000 followers, and my goal is to track down descendants of people who were forced out, to see if there is any sort of documentation or oral history there.”