USA TODAY’s “Seven Days of 1961” explores how sustained acts of resistance can bring about sweeping change. Throughout 1961, activists risked their lives to fight for voting rights and the integration of schools, businesses, public transit and libraries. Decades later, their work continues to shape debates over voting access, police brutality and equal rights.
JACKSON, Miss. – In the hours after his death, word spread quickly that Bob Moses had passed.
USA TODAY national correspondent Deborah Berry learned the news as she landed in Jackson. An exhibit at the airport displayed photos of civil rights legends. A black and white picture of Moses hung on the wall.
Berry and photographer Jasper Colt were in Mississippi – the heart of the civil rights movement – to work on USA TODAY’s “Seven Days of 1961” civil rights project. Everywhere they went that week in July, veterans and historians mourned Moses’ death. Moses, a field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, inspired activists and helped mobilize Black communities in Mississippi.
Here’s “someone who was willing to risk it all to get boots on the ground and go do the work and to lift up communities,” said Robert E. Luckett, interim director of the Council of Federated Organizations’ Civil Rights Education Center. The center aims to preserve the history of the Council of Federated Organizations, an umbrella organization of civil rights groups co-founded by Moses.
This year also marked the loss of other freedom fighters, many of whom, like Moses, worked in hostile territories in the South to dismantle Jim Crow and register Black residents to vote.
Some veterans were included in history books. Most were not. They came from Washington, DC; New-York; California; and Boston. Many activists left college to work for organizations such as SNCC or the Congress of Racial Equality. Most were locals battling segregation in their own backyards and often against their white neighbors, employers and co-workers.
In South Carolina, Mack Workman and eight other men, the “Friendship Nine,” chose to do 30 days in jail in protest instead of paying bail after staging a sit-in at a lunch counter in 1961 in Rock Hill. Four of the “Friendship Nine” have died.
“We did this together, and it is something I would never forget,” said Workman, 79.
Pamela Junior, director of the Mississippi Museum of Civil Rights, said she is worried that many civil rights veterans, mentors in their 80s and 90s, are dying and younger activists don’t have the same “warrior spirit.”
“The community is hurting because you don’t know who is going to die next,” Junior said.
Here are some other civil rights veterans who died in 2021. As the old folks say, they have “gone home to glory.”
anding was one of nine students at Tougaloo College who conducted a “read-in” at a whites-only public library in 1961 in Jackson. The students, who worked closely with civil rights icon Medgar Evers, became known as the “Tougaloo Nine.” Anding continued his civil rights work as a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
Gavin took a bus from California to the District of Columbia to participate in the March on Washington in 1963. She worked in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) office in Washington and for the Council of Federated Organizations in Jackson.
Rogers organized, protested and was arrested for participating in demonstrations in Tuskegee, Alabama, including the 54-mile march from Selma to Montgomery in 1965. He worked for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and helped register people to vote.
Jordan, a civil rights attorney, was a law clerk for Donald Hollowell when he represented two Black students who wanted to integrate the University of Georgia in 1961. He served as Georgia’s field secretary for the NAACP, executive director of the United Negro College Fund and president of the National Urban League. His involvement in the Voter Education Project helped raise funds for civil rights organizations to educate and register Black voters. He also served as an adviser to President Bill Clinton.
Morris was a field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and executive director of the Mississippi Food Bank. He worked with the Council of Federated Organizations in Mississippi. Morris helped create the Poor People’s Cooperation to address poverty among Black Mississippians.
Smith, who served as pastor of the First Baptist Church of North Brentwood in Maryland, for more than 50 years, was a longtime civil rights activist, NAACP leader and a Freedom Rider. He joined the Freedom Ride from Washington, DC, to Florida in 1961. Smith was arrested multiple times for his civil rights activities, including the ride to Florida. I have joined a chapter of the White Citizens’ Council, a white supremacy group, to disrupt its meetings.
Marco Garcia/AP
Joyner was one of five Black girls in 1954 to join Western High School in Baltimore. She was active with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and former president of the Hawaii Martin Luther King Jr. Coalition. Her efforts helped make Martin Luther King Day a holiday in Hawaii.
Martinez headed New York Friends of SNCC, and her efforts helped raise funds for SNCC’s projects in the South. She participated in Freedom Summer in Mississippi, where activists worked to register Black residents to vote. During her time at SNCC, Martinez helped edit “Letters from Mississippi,” which included firsthand accounts of young Freedom Summer volunteers.
Frye was a member of the Congress of Racial Equality and a field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in Alabama and Mississippi. In SNCC, I have participated in Freedom Summer where I have helped register Black residents. I have joined other protests, including at the Democratic National Convention in 1960.
Richardson was a leader of the Cambridge Nonviolent Action Committee and worked with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee to try to dismantle segregation on the eastern shore of Maryland. Richardson advocated for Blacks to defend themselves when attacked by white mobs and police.
Moses was a field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in Mississippi and program director for the Council of Federated Organizations. I have helped organize Freedom Summer, helped create the Mississippi Democratic Freedom Party and founded the Algebra Project, a math education program dedicated to helping Black students.
Stembridge was an administrator in SNCC’s office in Atlanta where she helped coordinate a conference and produced the organization’s first publication, the Student Voice, a weekly newspaper. She was an advocate for gay issues.
Patton was a Freedom Rider out of Nashville and participated in sit-ins at lunch counters and other demonstrations in the South. Patton served as a runner during the sit-ins, calling in arrests from nearby payphones, so organizers could send in more students.
Times participated in the march for voting rights from Selma to Montgomery in Alabama. She housed activists and conducted a one-woman bus boycott against Montgomery’s public transportation.
McMillan was active in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in Dallas where she registered Black voters and collected poll taxes to ensure they could vote. Her involvement in her took off when her son was sentenced to 10 years in prison after breaking a milk bottle during a protest. She co-founded the Dallas Black Women’s United Front and Anti-Klan Network.
Shipman was the first female vice president of the North Carolina chapter of the NAACP and the first woman president of the Greensboro chapter of the NAACP. She participated in sit-ins and became a founder and board member at the International Civil Rights Center and Museum in the same building where the sit-ins happened.
Jackson-Vails joined her fellow students at Tougaloo College, who protested at a whites-only public library. The demonstration spurred other college students and the community to demonstrate support. A marker honoring Jackson-Vails and the other students stands outside the library.
Black was a professor, labor organizer and longtime civil rights activist and organizer out of Chicago who helped build a network of support for Martin Luther King Jr. Former President Barack Obama praised Black for his work. “I thought I had a responsibility to bring about change: peace, justice and equality,” Black told USA TODAY in February.
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George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism