The Peekskill Riots: Episode Five “Wake Up America”

The Peekskill Riots Ep. 5: "Wake Up America"

After thousands of concertgoers were attacked during the Peekskill Riots of 1949, the same system that sanctioned this violence began rewriting history to be as though it never happened. This was done on a national level by erasing the career and legacy of Paul Robeson. His records, books, films, and writings were taken out of distribution, altered, or otherwise suppressed so that his influence as a force for change could be extinguished. Local figures in Peekskill followed this trend to downplay and reframe the riots, either to cast Paul Robeson as solely responsible or to suppress the story entirely. History is repeated by those who do not learn it, which is why they will do everything to ensure you can’t either.

The Fifth and Final Episode of the Peekskill Riots docu-series presents the treatment of this history as an instructive example of how the cover-up was just as destructive as the riots themselves.