The Black Spot
The Black Spot was a makeshift social club for the black soldiers of Company E at the Derry Army Air Corps Base, built in 1930 from an old requisition shed. It became a popular jazz venue drawing white civilians from Derry and beyond, and was burned down by the Maine Legion of White Decency in a racist arson attack that killed dozens. The fire ended the 1929-30 cycle of violence in Derry and left a lasting scar on the town's history.
Origins and Construction
The Black Spot began as a condemned requisition shed on the Derry Army Air Corps Base, a dark and smelly building with a dirt floor and only two small windows. Major Fuller assigned it to Company E after the Town Council complained about black soldiers drinking in downtown bars, making the downtown "blind pigs" off-limits to them. The men were initially depressed by the space, but a Pfc. named Dick Hallorann inspired them to renovate it themselves. Over the summer of 1930, they hammered, nailed, and cleaned, cutting additional windows and installing colored glass panes acquired through "midnight requisitions." They partitioned off a kitchen with a grill and deep-fryers, ran in an electric line, and kept the oiled dirt floor neat. By July, the club was open on weekends, serving sodas, hamburgers, and slaw-dogs. The men put up a sign reading "THE BLACK SPOT" and below it "COMPANY E AND GUESTS."
The Jazz Band and Growing Popularity
Company E discovered it had a decent Dixieland combo among its members, including Martin Devereaux on drums, Ace Stevenson on cornet, Pop Snopes on barrelhouse piano, and George Brannock on saxophone. The band grew hotter as autumn approached, and white civilians from Derry and surrounding towns began to attend, bringing their own high-quality liquor in brown bags. The club became so crowded on weekends that dancers stood hip to hip, and the music drew fraternity boys from the University of Maine at Orono. The Town Council, particularly Horst Mueller and his associates, grew increasingly angry at the spectacle of young white people socializing with black soldiers just a quarter-mile from the grand Victorian houses on West Broadway.
The Fire
On a Saturday night in early November 1930, members of the Derry branch of the Maine Legion of White Decency attacked the Black Spot. Some came through the greenbelt between the base and West Broadway, wearing white sheets and carrying torches made from Louisville Sluggers wrapped with burlap. Others arrived in a brand-new Packard automobile, which was waved through the base checkpoint. The attackers doused their torches with gasoline and threw them through the back windows into the kitchen. The building caught fire almost instantly. The single door became jammed as panicked patrons pushed against it from inside, trapping many. Trevor Dawson commandeered a cargo truck driven by Sergeant Wilson, who had tormented Will Hanlon earlier that year, and rammed the side of the building twice, creating an opening. The final death toll was around eighty, including eighteen men from Company E, fourteen or fifteen black civilians, four members of the jazz band, and numerous white patrons. Will Hanlon survived by escaping through a window with the help of Dawson and Hallorann.
Aftermath and Significance
The fire at the Black Spot effectively ended the 1929-30 cycle of murder and disappearance in Derry, serving as a monstrous sacrifice that sent whatever force haunted the town back to sleep for another quarter-century. The Maine Legion of White Decency was largely finished in Derry after the fire, as the violence had gotten out of hand. Thousands of people turned out for the funerals of both black and white victims; businesses closed for nearly a week, and hospitals treated the injured free of charge. The army dispersed the survivors of Company E to other bases. Will Hanlon, who had lost most of his friends in the fire, later returned to Derry with his wife and bought a farm, where he raised his son Mike. He told Mike that the fire made him a man, and that the soil of Derry seemed to nourish bad things, hurtful things, in a way he could not explain. Mike Hanlon, as an adult, came to see the Black Spot fire as one of the periodic ritual sacrifices that punctuate Derry's cycle of violence, a pattern tied to the presence of It beneath the town.
