Murals depicting the confederate flag have been removed from an elementary school in Crossville, Tennessee, after a local man complained that they represent racist symbols. “They are both in one public school elementary gym where all the children go to play every day,” said resident David Clark in social media posts that included pictures of the symbols. “Germany does not display Nazi symbols. This is not heritage, it is racism,” he wrote.
The murals were of a large confederate battle flag and a man carrying a confederate flag. The second mural shows the man standing near a tree from which a white figure in a blue outfit is hanging by his sports jersey from a tree. Nearby is a wagon that appears to be broken down from which a white, surrender flag is flying. Nearby are an eagle that is roped to the ground and what looks tiger with its head buried in the ground.
All of the depicted figures are mascots from local schools. The figure hanging from the tree is meant to be a North Cumberland Patriot, South Cumberland Elementary School’s main sports rival. An assistant in the Cumberland Country School Board said the Schools Director, Janet Graham, had given school personnel orders to fix the murals.
According to the assistant, Jane Franklin, the branch from the which the figure is hanging has been painted over with white clouds, and something is to be inserted beneath the hanging figure’s feet to make it look as though he’s standing on the ground.
The mural depicting the large confederate flag has been painted solid red.
An outcry over the confederate flag, as well as statues and other memorials named after Confederate heroes, has been building for years with activists calling for the removal of such memorials or changes to their names. Many supporters of the monuments staying as they are say they are an important link to the nation’s past.
A school board in Salt Lake City, Utah, voted to change the name of the city’s oldest elementary school, the Andrew Jackson Elementary School, last month. The board voted to adopt the name, “Mary Jackson Elementary School,” after NASA’s first female African-American engineer.