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Michigan Roundtable Highlights 'Sundown Towns' In America

DETROIT (WWJ) - Sundown towns -- do they still exist in Michigan?

Dr. Jim Loewen, a best selling author and sociologist, will be in Birmingham this week to speak at a Michigan Roundtable about towns that purposely kept black people out.

He says in his research, he was surprised to find that there were more than 500 sundown towns in Illinois, and hundreds more in Michigan and pretty much everywhere but the traditional south.

"Now-a-days you can't just declare that black folks aren't welcome, which you really could, flatly, up until 1968," said Loewen."Which many places did ... up until the year 2000."

Loewen will speak at the Community House in Birmingham on Thursday.

Find more information HERE.

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