Black UW students want school to remove 70-ton boulder

MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- Black students at the University of Wisconsin-Madison want the school to remove a 70-ton boulder from campus because its nickname is a racial slur.

The Wisconsin State Journal reports the rock has sat on campus since 1925. It’s officially known as Chamberlin Rock after Thomas Crowder Chamberlain, a 19th-century geologist and university president. But at the time of its discovery some referred to the boulder colloquially as a racial slur that was commonly used at the time to describe any large dark rock.

Black students at UW-Madison also have called for the removal of the campus’ Abraham Lincoln statue.