Crews in Raleigh removed the largest remnants of a 75-foot-tall Confederate monument that sat near the grounds of the state Capitol for 125 years.
The granite pillar that had ed a statue of a Confederate soldier was pulled from its base in Raleigh to cheers from a crowd of onlookers late Tuesday night, news outlets reported.
By about 7 a.m. Wednesday, after the pedestal was also removed, all that remained was a low-lying part of the monument's base covered in a tarp, according to WNCN-TV.
On Friday, along with two other nearby Confederate memorials, citing public safety.
Crews worked for three days to disassemble the structure that ed the statues, bringing in cranes, towing straps and metal rods to dismantle it piece by piece.
Photos showed the stone pedestal displaying the dedication “To Our Confederate Dead” being hoisted into the air, with the initials “BLM,” for Black Lives Matter, and the words “No Justice” scrawled across it. Just the stone steps were left late Tuesday.
Kenny Lee, a Black man who grew up in North Carolina, was quoted by The News & Observer as saying that watching the monument come down was like "witnessing a new history.”
“Some would say that you’re erasing history and getting rid of history and so forth,” he said. “But we’re just creating a new future."
