A. PHILLIP RANDOLPH
He led 250,000 people in the historic 1963 March on Washington, fought to ban discrimination in the armed forces, and fought for equal labor rights for African Americans.
ADAM CLAYTON POWELL
He was a black American public official and pastor who became a prominent liberal legislator and civil-rights leader.
She was the first African American to be enrolled at the University of Alabama (UA), in 1952.
A black American civil-rights activist who was a close advisor to Martin Luther King Jr.
A Mayor of Nashville who helped minorities, especially African Americans have voting power and continued to work for African American rights.
He was a pro segregation politician and commissioner of public safety. He is infamous for unleashing dogs and firehoses against peaceful protesters.
He was a baptist preacher who organized sit ins and civil rights marches. He worked closely with Martin Luther King.
He was a key civil rights leader in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee whose leadership led to the Albany Movement in southwest Georgia.
American journalist and civil rights activist who withstood economic, legal, and physical intimidation to champion racial equality, most notably in the integration of public schools in Little Rock, Arkansas
A leader of CORE's operations in Mississippi and Louisiana, COFO's assistant project director and a Freedom rider on a Trailways bus from Montgomery, Alabama to Jackson, Mississippi
DR. William ANDERSON
He was the president of the Albany Movement and a member of the board of the SCSC; in addition, he has held a number of prestigious medical positions.
Edgar Daniel NIXON
He was the leader of NAACP and worked with MLK to organize the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
The chief justice of the United States during a period of sweeping changes in U.S. constitutional law, especially in the areas of race relations, criminal procedure, and legislative apportionment.
He is the oldest of the "Little Rock Nine," a group of first African American high school students to integrate; they enrolled at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, following the Supreme Court ruling to desegregate in 1954..
FANNIE LOU HAMER
African-American civil rights activist who worked to desegregate the Mississippi Democratic Party and get African Americans the right to vote.
American minister and civil rights activist who established, with Martin Luther King, Jr., and others, the Southern Christian Leadership Council and who worked to end segregation in the South.
U.S. Democratic Party politician and four-time governor of Alabama who led the South's fight against federally ordered racial integration in the 1960s.
American civil rights activist who, as a leader of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), helped shape the civil rights movement through his nonviolent activism and organizing of sit-ins and Freedom Rides, which broadened popular support for passage of the Civil Rights and Voting Rights acts in the mid-1960s.
He, along with King, helped found the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in 1960. He coordinated the Freedom Ride and organized several marches.
American civil rights activist who became the first African American student at the University of Mississippi.
He was a Unitarian minister, who was a civil rights activist. He was a member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and took part in the Selma to Montgomery protest march in 1965.
35th president of the United States who passed the Civil Rights act, and tried to end segregation. He was assassinated while riding in a motorcade in Dallas.
He was the sheriff of Dallas County, in Alabama. He was one of the officials responsible for the violent arrests of civil rights protesters.
JIMMIE LEE JACKSON
He took part in a protest demonstration in favour of African American voter registration. He was shot in the stomach by a state trooper during the protest, which sparked the SCLC in holding the Selma-Montgomery marches.
He was an influential SNCC leader and is recognized by most as one of the important leaders of the whole civil rights movement.
American politician who served more than 35 years as mayor of Selma, Alabama. He was in office during the Selma to Montgomery marches of the African-American Civil Rights Movement.
He was police chief of Albany, Georgia, who effectively thwarted the efforts of the Albany Movement. He ensured the arrest of Martin Luther King Jr.
She was a little girl when she became famous for fighting the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas in the Supreme Court. Her case helped all black children get a better education.
MARTIN LUTHER KING
Baptist minister and social activist who led the civil rights movement in the United States until his death by assassination in 1968.
A civil-rights activist, whose murder received national attention and made him a martyr to the cause of the civil rights movement.
A Mississippi sharecropper and the great uncle of Emmett Till, the fourteen-year-old boy brutally murdered in the summer of 1955.
U.S. politician who, as governor of Arkansas, fought against the desegregation of Little Rock Central High School in 1957.
Pastor and civil rights leader who was Martin Luther King's chief aide and closest associate during the civil rights movement
U.S. attorney general and adviser during the administration of Pres. John F.Kennedy. Later U.S. senator, he was assassinated while campaigning for the presidential nomination.
Civil rights activist whose refusal to relinquish her seat on a public bus to a white man precipitated the Montgomery bus boycott in Alabama.
He was Governor of Mississippi, playing a role in the riots of Oct. 1 1962, the day after James H. Meredith, a 29-year-old black Air Force veteran, sought to enroll at the University of Mississippi campus in Oxford.
Civil-rights leader who served as the executive director of the NAACP. He was often referred to as the senior statesman of the U.S. Civil Rights Movement.
SCHWERNER, GOODMAN, CHENEY
They were three young civil rights workers: James, Andrew, and Michael. They were murdered by the Ku Klux Klan in Mississippi. They had been working to register black voters in Mississippi during Freedom Summer.
West-Indian-born civil-rights activist, leader of black nationalism in the United States in the 1960s and originator of its rallying slogan, "black power."
She became the first African-American student to graduate from the University of Alabama. She later joined the civil rights division of the U.S. Department of Justice.
16TH STREET BAPTIST CHURCH BOMBING
terrorist attack in Birmingham, Ala., on Sept. 15, 1963, on a predominantly African American baptist church by local members of the Ku Klux Klan (KKK). Resulting in 14 injuries and the death of four girls, the attack garnered widespread national outrage.
1964 CIVIL RIGHTS ACT
Comprehensive U.S. legislation intended to end discrimination based on race, colour, religion, or national origin; it is often called the most important U.S. law on civil rights since Reconstruction
Residents of a town in Georgia, launched a campaign to eliminate segregation in all facets of local life. The movement captured national attention when local leaders invited Martin Luther King, Jr. to join the protest. The movement was a formative learning experience for King and other civil rights organizers.1962.
BATTLE OF OLE MISS
James Meredith broke the color barrier in 1962 as the first African American student at University of Mississippi. The violent riot that followed was one of the most deadly clashes of the civil rights era, seriously wounding many U.S. Marshals and killing two civilians, and forcing the federal government to send thousands of soldiers to restore the peace.
Civil rights marchers headed east out of Selma on U.S. Route 80. They got only as far as the Edmund Pettus Bridge six blocks away, where state and local lawmen attacked them with billy clubs and tear gas and drove them back into Selma.
Things were so bad in Birmingham, Alabama, during the early 1960s, that a bomb could go off at anytime. From 1950 to 1960, dozens of bombings were committed in Birmingham by unknown terrorists. Black homes or businesses were usually the targets of these explosions. In most cases, the victims were alleged to have committed an offense against the rigid structure of white supremacy.
BROWN V. BOARD OF EDUCATION
A case in which on May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that racial segregation in public schools violated the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which prohibits the states from denying equal protection of the laws to any person within their jurisdictions; also, the decision declared that separate educational facilities for white and African American students were inherently unequal.
CITIZEN COUNCILS (MISSISSIPPI)
This white supremacist newspaper, of the Citizens' Council of Mississippi between 1955 and 1961, was intended to spread a pro-segregationist message throughout the southern states with the hope that white people would be outraged that their children had to share classrooms with African-Americans and would organize to resist racial desegregation and restore white supremacist rule.
An interracial American organization established by James Farmer in 1942 to improve race relations and end discriminatory policies through direct-action projects.
DOCTRINE OF INTERPOSITION
Opponents of integration used the idea that the state could "interpose" between an unconstitutional federal mandate and local authorities based on State Sovereignty.
Blacks and whites who participated in peaceful protest by riding buses together through the American South in 1961.
The well-publicized voter registration drives brought national attention to the subject of black disenfranchisement, and this eventually led to the 1965 Voting Rights Act, federal legislation that among other things outlawed the tactics Southern states had used to prevent blacks from voting. Freedom Summer also instilled among African Americans a new consciousness and a new confidence in political action.
These people advocated slow, measured progress toward racial justice and harmony, rather than the immediate freedom that many demanded.
An act of nonviolent protest against a segregated lunch counter in Greensboro, N.C., that began on Feb. 1, 1960. Its success led to a wider sit-in movement, organized primarily by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), that spread throughout the South.
LETTER FROM BIRMINGHAM JAIL
The most important written document of the civil rights era. The letter served as a reproducible account of the long road to freedom in a movement that was largely centered around actions and spoken words.
LITTLE ROCK 9
Governor Orval Faubus had the National Guard block these nine black students from entering Central High in Little Rock, Arkansas. President Eisenhower heard of this and sent Federal Troops to protect the nine black students.
MARCH ON WASHINGTON
This march for jobs and Freedom took place in Washington, D.C., on August 28, 1963. It was attended by some 250,000 people.
An American political party created in Mississippi, during the civil rights movement, to challenge the legitimacy of the white-only US Democratic Party.
MONTGOMERY IMPROVEMENT ASSOCIATION
It was formed by black ministers and community leaders in Montgomery, Alabama. Under the leadership of Martin Luther King, Jr., it was instrumental in guiding the Montgomery bus boycott.
An African-American civil rights organization. Its mission is "to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to eliminate racial hatred and racial discrimination".
These were part of a nonviolent direct action campaign to end racial segregation at lunch counters in downtown Nashville, Tennessee.
They were white supremacists who went out at night terrorizing African-Americans in their community.
A method of nonviolent protest against laws or policies in order to force a change or secure concessions.
This was the name given to the plan devised by Martin Luther King and the SCLC to challenge the system of segregation in Birmingham, Alabama.
A nonsectarian American agency established by the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., and his followers to coordinate and assist local organizations working for the full equality of African Americans.
American political organization, led by students that played a central role in the civil rights movement in the 1960s.
" WE SHALL OVERCOME"
A protest song that became a key anthem of the African-American Civil Rights Movement.