In August of 1898 the Erath Appeal ran a story about a fight that began when a white 8 year-old girl threw a rock at a black girl on “aristocratic college hill” and called her names. When the unnamed black mother went to the mother to complain, the mother, Mrs. Skipper-Williams, attacked the black mother with a buggy whip. The black mother took the whip away and used it on the hostile mother. The father stood by and according to the Erath Appeal did nothing to help his wife. When the Erath Appeal ran the story, the father was referred to as a “skulking cur” for not getting involved. The morning after this story appeared, Mr. and Mrs. Skipper-Williams went to the Erath Appeal office and the mother knifed the editor, Austin King to death. In December, the parents were sentenced to prison, 18 years for the father and 20 for the mother. The Erath Appeal ran this notice: The time will come when a newspaper can tell the local happenings of the day without endangering the editor’s life . . . “