We Carry Their Bones
The Search for Justice at the Dozier School for Boys
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15
The Search for Justice at the Dozier School for Boys
Ratings4
Average rating4
Forensic anthropologist Erin Kimmerle investigates of the notorious Dozier Boys School--the true story behind the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Nickel Boys--and the contentious process to exhume the graves of the boys buried there in order to reunite them with their families.
The Arthur G. Dozier Boys School was a well-guarded secret in Florida for over a century, until reports of cruelty, abuse, and "mysterious" deaths shut the institution down in 2011. Established in 1900, the juvenile reform school accepted children as young as six years of age for crimes as harmless as truancy or trespassing. The boys sent there, many of whom were Black, were subject to brutal abuse, routinely hired out to local farmers by the school's management as indentured labor, and died either at the school or attempting to escape its brutal conditions.
In the wake of the school's shutdown, Erin Kimmerle, a leading forensic anthropologist, stepped in to locate the school's graveyard to determine the number of graves and who was buried there, thus beginning the process of reuniting the boys with their families through forensic and DNA testing. The school's poorly kept accounting suggested some thirty-one boys were buried in unmarked graves in a remote field on the school's property. The real number was at least twice that. Kimmerle's work did not go unnoticed; residents and local law enforcement threatened and harassed her team in their eagerness to control the truth she was uncovering--one she continues to investigate to this day.
We Carry Their Bones is a detailed account of Jim Crow America and an indictment of the reform school system as we know it. It's also a fascinating dive into the science of forensic anthropology and an important retelling of the extraordinary efforts taken to bring these lost children home to their families--an endeavor that created a political firestorm and a dramatic reckoning with racism and shame in the legacy of America.
Reviews with the most likes.
This was a hard book for me to read, mostly because it (basically) took place in my backyard. I remember watching the news blurbs about the political back-and-forth taking place and shaking my head. Social media back-and-forth was depressing to read, because the comments under these news stories were by and large criticizing the team for stirring things up. The big-s South is alive and well in the panhandle of Florida.
In (very) brief, there was a reform school in Marianna, Florida, and lots of unsavory things happened there behind closed doors that were never properly investigated or recorded. Deaths happened, more than they accounted for, and a team was called in to look for unmarked graves and provide closure to families. The number of dead went from the institution's “idk like 15 or something” to over 55. There was lots of pushback from the surrounding community for digging into this school's history, because they believed the school provided a service to the community. It's a super sad story, and lots of fiction books were based on this school's history.
I really enjoyed the author's writeup of the science behind their forensic investigation, and what it meant to the families of children who went missing after being sent to this school. The timeline was a bit confusing as presented in the book, as the author hopped around a bit in telling the story of what led to the excavation, the families' histories, and the fallout. The story is compelling, sad, and incredibly graphic though, which made my timeline complaints rather mild in the face of the rest.
A word of caution before anyone decides to pick this book up though, it's not for the faint of heart. There's lots of descriptions of what surviving kids saw while in this institution, and all of it is incredibly disturbing. Reader beware, but absolutely pick it up if you're interested, if for no other reason than the story of this school and these kids need to be heard.
