The threads that bind: Group makes quilts to honor Alachua County lynching victims

In Alachua County, a group of quilters gather around a quilting square to stitch together the painful stories left untold. For each of the eight cities in Alachua County — Waldo, Gainesville, High Springs, Alachua, Micanopy, Newberry, Hawthorne and Archer — different people from each city come together to tackle the rough history of lynching throughout the county.

Dawn Beachy, 70, a Gainesville native, spearheaded the project in hopes of educating people about the history of racial terror in Alachua County. The project started in 2018, and Beachy plans on wrapping up the quilts by the summer of 2025.