President Joe Biden on Friday designated a national monument to commemorate a 1908 race riot in Springfield, Illinois, that left several people dead, hundreds injured and destroyed dozens of Black-owned businesses and homes.

In August 1908, mobs of white residents tore through Illinois’ capital city under the pretext of meting out judgment against two jailed Black men. After authorities secretly moved the prisoners to another lockup miles away, the mob took out its anger on the city’s Black population.

The riot fueled the formation of the influential civil rights organization, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), in 1909.