FL - White House Boys, Dozier School for Boys, Marianna

[LietKynes]

I dread what they will find !!

Appalling for that one family who opened their son's coffin, to find boards inside and no body.
What was that "school" hiding ?

 

[SeesSeas]

State Will Investigate Possible Discovery of More Remains at Dozier Site
PUBLISHED 6:36 PM EDT Jun. 20, 2019
UPDATED 12:07 PM ET Jul. 14, 2019
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Anthropologists will return to the shuttered Dozier School for Boys this week to investigate the possible discovery of more unmarked graves on the former reform school's grounds.

• Potential graves discovered by contractor removing Hurricane Michael debris
• 27 possible graves located using ground-penetrating radar
• Hundreds of boys abused at Dozier School in 1950s and 1960s

[...]

 

[JaxFlaGal]

Marianna residents ready for Dozier saga to come to a close
Ground-penetrating radar scans began this week.

Even if the 27 anomalies don’t end up being human remains, ground-penetrating radar will map the entire campus to end the speculation once and for all.

The Department of State, which has closed the site to the public, anticipates the latest investigation could take six months to a year. The resumption of fieldwork was announced last month.

 

[doodles1211]

We're now getting a closer look inside the search for more human remains at the Dozier School for Boys.

University of South Florida researchers snapped shots this week and they're slowly scraping through every inch of the site while also using ground-penetrating radar and other remote-sensing tech.

Dr. Erin Kimmerle, the head researcher, says by reconstructing the ground where the burials could have been they could use process of elimination to see if there's anything there.

"So you have to kind of look at that history and how the land was used to know what you're interpreting and what you're looking at," said Dr. Kimmerle. "In terms of looking for other burials in different parts of the campus, you can really look at probability theory to look at how likely is it somebody was buried here."

The school spans over 1,400 acres, originally meant as a place for troubled children.

It was shut down after families say kids died from "questionable or suspicious circumstances."

Dr. Kimmerle says if her team does find human remains, that's when the process slows down.

Search for human remains continues at Dozier School for Boys

The group will continue to examine the area through next week.

 

[doodles1211]

The Florida School for Boys, also known as the Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys (AGDS), was a reform school operated by the state of Floridain the panhandle town of Marianna from January 1, 1900, to June 30, 2011.[1][2] A second campus was opened in the town of Okeechobee in 1955. For a time, it was the largest juvenile reform institution in the United States.[3]

Throughout its 111-year history, the school gained a reputation for abuse, beatings, rapes, torture, and even murder of students by staff. Despite periodic investigations, changes of leadership, and promises to improve, the allegations of cruelty and abuse continued.

After the school failed a state inspection in 2009, the governor ordered a full investigation. Many of the historic and recent allegations of abuse and violence were confirmed by separate investigations by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement in 2010, and by the Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice in 2011.[4] State authorities closed the school permanently in June 2011. At the time of its closure, it was a part of the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice.[5] ....

Florida School for Boys - Wikipedia

 

[doodles1211]

I believe this is the same place that they were doing that really harsh "boot camp" for young men. One had died pretty recent to the last time I was there. They were still in a court battle back then. It was shortly before they closed the place down. My ex is in LE there and he said they were so hard on those boys.... worse than the military at one time.

 

[borndem]

Ummppfff, this sounds like a setting for a horror movie. Beating a 16 year old to death X 40 or more?? I've heard that "reform schools" were very tuff places, especially back in the 1940's and -5o's, but not deaths even then. Am I that naive?

 

[stygianowl]

Ummppfff, this sounds like a setting for a horror movie. Beating a 16 year old to death X 40 or more?? I've heard that "reform schools" were very tuff places, especially back in the 1940's and -5o's, but not deaths even then. Am I that naive?

An excellent in-depth article on this place from 2013:

The Bones of Marianna

 

[doodles1211]

Yeah, horror movie material for sure! This is the place I was thinking it was and here is an article on the boy that died there that got this place shut down for good... so sad and didn't have to happen.

Fla. Juvenile Boot Camp Death: No Charges
Martin Anderson case - Wikipedia
8 Acquitted in Death of Boy, 14, in Florida

 

[borndem]

An excellent in-depth article on this place from 2013:

The Bones of Marianna

Many thanks, @stygianowl, for the article. Absolutely chilling. SMH. I am still having a tuff time getting myself to breathe at a normal rate.
Although I'd like to say "unbelievable," I won't/can't because the proof that it happened is in that article and it is/was in so many hearts of young-then-old men who endured it and saw it. And there were too damm many who endured it and died because of it. The "men" who tortured many and killed some were not human -- they had lost that part of being a living thing. I hope somehow, and somewhere in this universe, that justice will be served to them on a filthy cot or floor in some dingy little white-painted house somewhere -- for eternity.

 

[SeesSeas]

27 possible graves turn up empty at notorious Dozier reform school, authorities say
July 23, 2019
27 possible graves turn up empty at notorious Dozier reform school, authorities say
Anomalies identified at the infamous Florida reformatory have turned up no evidence of human remains, the Florida Department of State said.
[...]

Investigation Near Dozier School for Boys Reveals No Human Remains
PUBLISHED 1:58 PM EDT Jul. 23, 2019
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — The first phase of a new investigation at the former Dozier School for Boys found no new evidence of human remains, according to a University of South Florida research team.
[...]
There is a second phase planned to examine the entire property.

“While the recently reported anomalies were found using remote sensing technology above the ground, we were able to look below the surface and clearly determine no graves or human remains are present,” said Dr. Erin Kimmerle.
[...]

 

[borndem]

I dread what they will find !!

Appalling for that one family who opened their son's coffin, to find boards inside and no body.
What was that "school" hiding ?

bbm
Indeed.
It doesn't take much of a stretch of my imagination...
What one man won't do, 2 or 3 or more will, and keep coming back for more.
Again, IMO, it goes back to "because they could."

 

[borndem]

I don't consider a lot of these kids really bad kids. Most of them were runaways running away from a bad home life or truancy. Some were as young as 6 years old. Unbelievable how a little six year old could be sent to reform school in our country.
>>>> rsbm <<<<
I pray that The White House Boys get all of this exposed once and for all. They have fought a long honorable fight. None of these boys should be buried there at this house of horrors. They either need to be returned to their families or a special cemetery should be made just for them so they can finally rest in peace.
May the truth finally come to light.

Beautiful post, OBE.
What a horrible, something-beyond-sadness, that ride you take must be. Reading your post gave me shivers, a dry mouth, deep sadness, and near-disbelief which, of course, changed to a you-must-believe-it-because-it-happened feeling.
Human beings can be the most untamed, cruelest and wildest animals on this planet, no doubt.
<shiver>

 

[borndem]

BBM

I find the bolded statement odd. Why would the bones be fragmented if they were interned right after they died? Had the bones been fragmented or fractured before death I wonder?

Scientists have found bodies that were centuries old and the full skeletons were still intact.

IMO

I would think a lot of those bones would be fragmented -- because the boys' spines, arms, legs, knees, you-name-it would have been horribly broken during those horrible and probably frequent beatings. And I don't see those ba****ds taking the time to separate the bones from one boy to the proper boy's grave for burial. OTOH, I would think that some boys' sets of bones would not be totally destroyed, and those bones would be essentially in one grave.
I do wonder how much forensics will be done on these bones... How big a project will this one be?

 

[borndem]

After reading these posts I am sick!!! What is it with Florida and not identifying people? I know from our own experiences how tightly they circle the wagons and I am hoping this time they are forced to identify every body that is buried there. Oh those poor poor children..............

Here's a little bit about Marianna brought to you by Google:

Marianna - City in Florida
Description
Marianna is a city in Jackson County, Florida, United States. The population was 6,102 at the 2010 census. In 2017 the estimated population was 7,293. It is the county seat of Jackson County and is home to Chipola College. The official nickname of Marianna is "The City of Southern Charm".

Wikipedia

Sounds like a place where "everybody knows your name," etc., what your father did, the sheriff knows what everybody did and when; the barber's day off, knows the Buick salesman, the Cub Scout master, the piano teacher, the couple who "had to" get married in 1965, etc., etc.

Not many secrets, really, but people try to be discreet because they may end up sitting next to them in church on Sunday. Fairly typical small town.

My grandmother/grandfather lived in such a town, but it was 'way too small to hide much, so everybody lived pretty straight and narrow. But gossip was the pastime of a few woman as well as men.

 

[borndem]

Marianna is about 80 miles from my hometown & in the late 50s & maybe early 60s I remember our family going to the "Florida Boys School" to see the Christmas decorations. The residents worked year-round to build elaborate displays through which there was a driving tour. What happens behind the closed gates of such a facility can be very different from the public image.

I doubt Florida is the only state where there was abuse in institutions. However, just 25 miles east of Marianna is the state mental hospital in Chattahoochee. There was a book & 1989 movie "Chattahoochee", about horrific mistreatment of patients who were caged, unclothed & unwashed, just occasionally hosed down by firehoses.... worse conditions than anyone would tolerate for animals.

Isn't it frightening how inhumane people can be? It's too late for those in charge to be made accountable.... most are dead. Financial compensation to former residents can do little to repay their scarred lives now, but I think having the abuse exposed will validate their pain & help them to move forward.

Sad, sad, sad!

^^^^^
This

 

[MsMarple]

What amazes me about this investigation is that the authorities did investigate. Other institutions committed similar atrocities but were never thoroughly investigated and in many cases the survivors of the homes had to fight to shine light on their treatment.

Dozier is mentioned near the end of this long report on yet another institution, St. Joseph's Catholic Orphanage . Also mentioned in the article; Smyllum Park, a Scottish orphanage, an old boarding school in the Blackfeet Nation, Montana, a mother and baby home in Tuam, Galway. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

It's shocking to look at the long history of orphanages, asylums and homes for troubled children - over 200 years in the U.S. and much older in the rest of the world. And in many cases the driving motive wasn't charity but rather profit. Children were used as servants and factory workers and the institutions were also paid by the government. Some even reorganized their orphanages/institutions and called them "asylums" because the stipend was larger.

The Magdalene Sisters is a movie based on true stories from the "wayward" girls whose families committed them to the nuns to work in the laundries in order to "straighten" them out but IMO it was a convenient way for parents to hide a "wild" child and avoid embarrassment.

In 2006 a book written by a mother and her daughter sang the praises of a troubled youth camp in Moravia that supposedly helped the child work through trauma and acting out. Not long after the book was published the camp was closed due to allegations of abuse.

Such camps still exist. As one is shut down the same people move on to a different state and open another one. There are forums where kids from these camps share their stories. Rarely are the operators prosecuted; sometimes specific staff members are but it's an uphill battle since it's usually the word of angry, troubled teens against "trusted" staff members. When a child dies from abuse LE finally steps in.

Hopefully the Dozier School investigation will horrify people enough to demand more transparency and stricter regulations in the troubled youth industry.

 

[SeesSeas]

Colson Whitehead’s novel The Nickel Boys draws power from a real Florida story
Published July 18, 2019
Colson Whitehead is still surprised by fame, like having his face on the cover of Time magazine this week when his new novel, The Nickel Boys, was published.

The title refers to a fictional reform school, the Nickel Academy, in the Panhandle where boys are unthinkably abused by staff members.

The novel was inspired by the real-life history of the Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys, also known as the Florida School for Boys, which operated from 1900 to 2011 in Marianna. In 2009, the then-St. Petersburg Times published “For Their Own Good,” a series about the school that revealed a long history of beatings, rapes and unexplained deaths.
[...]

 

[mrz]

I can say this for fact- I was in one of these schools for boys in my teens. Provo Canyon Academy in Utah. I saw kids beat, abused, and drugged. Never raped, but all short of that. MOO- these places are a horrible option for reforming children. Provo Canyon has been in the news several times that I could find. I can almost guarantee this place at that time had to be nothing short of a nightmare for those kids.MOO
Petition to Shut Down Provo Canyon School - Petitions.net

https://www.petitions.net/petition_to_shut_down_provo_canyon_school
A testimony about Provo Canyon School - Asylum Horrible

asylum-horrible.blogspot.com/2016/06/a-testimony-about-provo-canyon-school.html

 

[SeesSeas]

Search continues for more bodies at Dozier School for Boys site
August 26, 2019
Forensic experts are gearing up to conduct a high-tech sweep of the grounds at a notorious Northwest Florida reform school where survivors remain convinced bodies of long-lost boys are still concealed.

University of South Florida forensic anthropologist Erin Kimmerle said Monday her team intends to return next month to the former Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys in Marianna to conduct light imaging detection and ranging tests, known as LIDAR.

“The challenge going forward with the property of course, is that today much of it is wooded, much more of it than what was wooded up until the 1980s,” Kimmerle said.
[...]