The APEX Museum in Atlanta, devoted to Black history since its founding in 1978, reported finding a “noose-like rope” in a tree, in an Instagram post signed by museum president and chief executive Dan Moore Jr. A picture in the post shows Atlanta police at the scene, and a report from local area WSB-TV said the incident on Wednesday is under investigation. The APEX Museum’s message said the rope “was deemed not to be a ‘noose’ by Homeland Security and has since been removed from the premises for evidence.”
In his message, Moore wrote, “For Black communities in the United States, a noose is a symbol of terror representing lynchings, hatred, racial violence, and a system that once publicly sanctioned the murder of Blacks to enforce white supremacy. Placed beside a museum dedicated to Black life and resilience, the rope reads as an act of intimidation: a clear message intended to wound … silence … and to remind people that the same threats and violence of our country’s past can be conjured in the present.”
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He added: “Museums are anchors of our communities, our country, and our world memories. They represent our trials, triumphs, griefs, hopes, journeys, evolutions, our hearts and our spirits. Such symbols of hatred in or near these institutions are a travesty that dishonor the work of scholars, activists, descendants, and survivors who have labored to turn historic stories full of pain and achievement into education and hope for the future.”
Current exhibits listed at the APEX Museum include “Sweet Auburn: Street of Pride” (about the Sweet Auburn Historic District in which the institution resides) as well “Africa: The Untold Story,” “The MAAFA: The African Holocaust,” “Women in STEM,” and “The Big Ideal! Black Inventors and Their Inventions.”