WINONA, Minn. – A Lake Park jogger called police that a noose was hanging from a large tree on the smaller Lake Winona. This was about 2:10 p.m. A park maintenance crew quickly took the noose down. Police spokesperson Jay Rasmussen said in his memory there hadn’t been any noose incidents in Winona. There were Ku Klux Klan members in Winona in the late 1800s and early 1900s And nooses remain a symbol of white racism that unnerves black people. It was thought that the Lake Park noose. not being weathered, had been hung only recently. It was about six feet off the ground.
Racism in Winona
In 1867 the Winona Library Association invited the prominent black editor Frederick Douglass to add Winona to his latest speaking tour. Douglass, in his late 40s and famous for his North Star newspaper and his lectures, was scheduled for a sell-out crowd at the Philharmonic Hall. When Douglass arrived in town to check into the Huff House, later the Kensington, at Second and Winona streets, he was denied a room. The owners didn’t accept black guests. There was no other suitable hotel in Winona. His sponsors, however, invited Douglass to stay overnight in their homes. At the speech Douglass kept the crowd spellbound for two hours.
Demographics
This is 2020 census data on Winona’s racial composition:
> White: 89.2%, including 3.2% Hispanic.
> Mixed race: 4.2%.
> Black: 2.2%.
> Asian: 2.2%.
> Native people: 0.3%.