LAWRENCE, Kan. — Residents of a historic area of Lawrence want to ditch their neighborhood’s name because it honors a slave owner.
The Lawrence Journal-World reports that the Pinckney Neighborhood Association announced this week that it is now taking suggestions for a new name. The neighborhood was spurred to consider a name change as a response to civil unrest felt throughout the country this past summer after the death of a Black man, George Floyd, at the hands of Minneapolis police.
The association said in its announcement that it felt uncomfortable with its name, “particularly since the neighborhood is a historically Black neighborhood.”