What Will the “White House Boys” Investigation Turn Up?

Six weeks ago the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice invited five men back to the school to dedicate a plaque outside the cinder block building where they were beaten and to close it down forever.

Roger Kiser, 63, of Brunswick, Ga., believes he witnessed two to three deaths while at the school in 1958 and 1959 and again in 1960. One was a white boy shaking cream to make butter under the dining table, when a school attendant suspected him of masturbating. He was taken away "and never seen again."

Another time, he saw one of the school staff members order two boys into the tumble dryer. Later, their bodies were hauled away and he and others were ordered to say nothing about it.

They were warned, Kiser said, that if they caught us talking to them "we would be taken to the White House and beaten. Corporal punishment was the means by which they controlled us," he said. "We lived in daily fear."

The men have also asked that the investigation include the school's use of the boys for slave labor, sexual abuse, sex trafficking and kidnapping for sexual assault.

But, a local historian, Dale Cox, says the graves really aren't that mysterious.

~ Ten supposedly date back to a 1914 fire that started when an oil lamp exploded in the main dormitory. Eight students and two employees were killed in that fire.

~ Eleven students and one employee died when an influenza epidemic struck in 1918.

That seemingly accounts for 22 of the 32 graves.

Cox claims the others all date from prior to 1949.

~ Three are allegedly of pets the students kept at the school.

~ An additional seven students died from various causes between 1897 and 1949 and also buried in cemetery.


Cox may or may not be right. I do wonder why the families of the students and employees who supposedly died and were buried at the Florida School for Boys didn’t claim the remains of their loved ones for a proper burial.

I’m not sure what the graves will yield, however the stories the White House Boys tell are pretty horrific, and a thorough investigation is clearly warranted!

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Chron.com

CNN

Painful Memories for the White House Boys

He’s in his 60’s, married for 42 years, and owns a multimillion-dollar company. He established a scholarship fund at the Arthur Dozier School for Boys where he speaks each year to the students about hard work and a hopeful future.

It was at that same school he learned his trade as an electrician, which turned him into a self-made success story. But, the future wasn’t always so bright for Dick Colon.

Roger Kiser, Dick Colon, Robert Straley and Michael O'McCarthy call themselves the ‘White House Boys’. All served time at the Florida School for Boys during the 1950s and ‘60s.

The men connected on the internet and began sharing stories of horrific physical beatings with long leather straps, reinforced with metal. Often, a large industrial fan was turned on during the beatings to drown out the screams of the boys, as they were tortured.

A makeshift cemetery on the grounds of the school holds thirty-one steel tube crosses. Painted white and unmarked, the men believe the crosses mark the graves of boys who suddenly vanished from the school, never to be seen again.

When boys disappeared from the school, administrators explained it away, said former student Roger Kiser.

They'd say, "Well, he ran away and the swamp got him," Kiser recalled. Or, "The gators got him." Or, 'Water moccasins got him."

It was the ‘White House Boys’ who convinced Florida Governor Charlie Crist to open an investigation into the school. They believe authorities will find the remains of children sent to the Florida School for Boys half a century ago.

Crist wants Florida Department of Law Enforcement, FDLE, to determine if anyone is buried there, whether crimes were committed, and if so, who was responsible.

The investigation will not be an easy one. Locating records and witnesses from fifty years ago will be difficult if not impossible. Many of the administrators and supervisors of the reform school are long dead.

The ‘White House Boys’ live with painful memories and say they want justice. They have waited most of their lives and will wait as long as it takes.

CNN