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LOCAL
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1C HAM P IQ M
July 28 - Aug. 3, 2016 • Page 15A
Time traveling
with Tom Keating
Local educator, researcher brings history
to life at DeKalb County History Center
Decatur educator, historian and
community advocate Tom Keating
discussed the topic of anti-semitism
in Decatur.
The DeKalb County History Center was filled to
capacity for a lunch and learn session featuring Tom
Keating. Photos by R. Scott Belzer
by R. Scott Belzer
sbelzer@dekalbchamp.com
I t may seem strange today, but
there was a period of time—1902
until 1932—when children attended
school Tuesday through Saturday in
Decatur.
According to local educator and
author Tom Keating, the practice has
always been strange—it only took a
new population to point it out.
Keating’s 60-page Saturday
School, completed in 1999, tells the
story of an early Decatur board of
education transitioning to the Monday
through Friday schedule students
know today. The book asserts the
one-day difference was a unique
institutionalization of bigotry and
intolerance practiced only in Decatur.
Keating held a talk at the DeKalb
County History Center on July 19 to
discuss further research on board
members responsible for the decision
as well as lessons learned since the
book’s publication. The history center
was filled to capacity with an audience
interested in hearing points that seem
to further prove Keating’s hypothesis.
“Why did Decatur have school on
Saturday?” Keating asked. “To keep
out the Jews.”
According to an article published
by Keating in the Decatur Community
Review in 1997, which cites research
into 1,500 other school systems
throughout the country, Decatur
censuses and oral interviews, an
influx of Jews from 1916 to 1926
both spurred the change and caused
significant backlash.
“The rechartering of the Ku Klux
Klan, the discriminatory practices
against Blacks, Catholics and Jews
documented by endless research
of those times, and the absence
of other plausible reasons suggest
that Saturday School had a singular
intent,” Keating wrote. “That intent
was to keep Jews, who observed the
Sabbath on Saturday, out of Decatur.”
Keating’s research eventually
revealed that Decatur was the only
school system in the country to uphold
this practice. He said City Schools
of Decatur has acknowledged this
wrongdoing but not apologized while
Decatur city officials have yet to do
either.
“I’m honored to be discussing
Saturday School again nearly 20
years after its publication,” Keating
said. “The story was not one that was
easy to learn about. It was buried in
history.”
Keating said his new research
brought him to the Decatur cemetery
to research six board members who
voted 3-3 to change the schedule in
1927, resulting in non-action: Charles
McKinney, Homer Adams, Frank
Hopkins, Catherine Hoke, George
“Scott” Candler and Andrew Sledd.
Keating’s research allowed him
to find board members’ ages at the
time of the decision, their average
age, as well as one important variable:
George Candler would go on to be a
DeKalb County politician remembered
as a Christian.
He was also able to confirm
McKinney was an avid pro-Monday-
school day advocate. Keating has
previously published that Hoke was
upset enough about the Tuesday
through Saturday schedule being
upheld that she resigned.
“I studied the head and footstones
of all but one member. The board
chairman—Hopkins—is not buried in
Decatur,” Keating said. “Every head
or footstone, save one, has name,
birth and death only. Scott Candler’s is
marked ‘Christian, Educator, Soldier,
Statesman and Devoted Servant of
the People of His County.”
Keating also pointed out a portrait
of Candler in the history center’s
archives that reads “Educator, Soldier,
Lawyer and Public Servant.” Rather
than remember Candler for his vote to
uphold the status quo of intolerance,
Keating said, history prefers to
remember him for his leadership.
“And it goes on: ‘Mayor of City of
Decatur, commissioner of roads and
revenue in DeKalb County, builder of
DeKalb water, sewer, health, fire and
library systems,”’ Keating said. “We
know, however, Christian is engraved
in stone.”
Keating called the Saturday
School story a Christian story, not a
Jewish one.
“My Jewish friends have to give
that up,” Keating said. “It’s a Christian
story about public policy and it
affected a certain group, very unique
in history.”
Keating concluded by advising
attendees to tell their own school
histories “warts and all,” to provide
historians perspective on times,
places and attitudes.
“School calendars affect lives,”
Keating said. “Consider how many
education meetings are held on
Sababths. Anti-semitism played out
in a unique way in Decatur and that
alone makes it worth sharing.”
County votes against SPLOST
by Horace Holloman
horace@dekalbchamp.com
After months of planning and
deliberating, two words gave
the DeKalb County Board of
Commissioners reason to hesitate to
vote against a special purpose local
option sales tax (SPLOST).
During the board’s July 19 meeting,
commissioners voted 5-0 against
putting a SPLOST referendum on the
November ballot.
District 2 Commissioner Larry
Rader said approving the SPLOST
would be a “poison pill” if it were to
pass. Passing SPLOST would increase
property taxes throughout the county
due to language in House Bill 596,
which was approved during last year’s
General Assembly.
According to an interpretation of
HB 596, the homestead tax exemption
would be suspended for the duration
of the proposed SPLOST, which
could potentially increase homestead
property taxes.
The SPLOST would have
generated an estimated $551 million in
funding over a five-year span.
“The assessment freeze would be
suspended if [SPLOST passes]. It’s
effectively a poison pill. There would
be an increase in the sales tax and
property tax for every homesteaded
taxpayer,” Rader said.
DeKalb County Interim CEO Lee
May said the bill’s intention wasn’t
to end an assessment freeze for
homeowners.
HB 596 states, “if the General
Assembly enacts an equalized
homestead option sales and use tax
and such tax is placed into effect in
DeKalb County during the period the
exemption granted by subsection of
this section is in effect, the exemption
granted by subsection of this section
shall be tolled for as long as the
equalized homestead option sales and
use tax is in effect.”
DeKalb County officials said the
word “tolled” should have been revised
or omitted from the section.
“Although we do not believe that
this is the legislative intent of the law’s
authors, we are acting according to this
interpretation until we can seek the bill’s
change in the next Georgia General
Assembly session,” May said.
Among the items on the proposed
SPLOST project list were road
repaving, reconstruction of existing fire
departments and a new consolidated
government center.
The estimated cost of the DeKalb
County government center was $40
million, roughly 9 percent of the
SPLOST funding.
More than 42 percent of the
SPLOST revenue was allocated to road
and drainage projects.
“We worked hard to try to come
to a resolution. Some had different
priorities. Some had roads and some
had public safety. It was a mixture
of different commissioners trying
to come together,” Commissioner
Mereda Johnson said. “We’ve heard
conversations of a fancy government
center but I don’t even have room for
an intern in the office I work in. We’re
trying to be an efficient and transparent
government.”
May said he was unsure whether
state lawmakers would correct the
wording of the bill, but said he was
hopefully the issue would be resolved.
“It’s sad. People were so excited
about getting their streets paved,”
Commissioner Kathie Gannon. “This is
going to be a difficult thing to fix.”