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Unsung heroes prevented the Civil Rights Movement from dying at the hands of authorities as they fought alongside well-known figures who assumed the spotlight as they soldiered behind the scenes.  When the dust cleared, they were left to pick up the pieces and faced death as first responders.

 One such leader was Prathia Hall, who put her life on the line for freedom. She piqued my interest for the work done in the rural South and the drive to succeed outweighed the forces to keep her down.

It seemed as if Hall had been banned from history or placed on the back burner when I came across her incredible story. She was an accomplished orator, poet, and defender of human rights who inspired Dr. Martin Luther King and countless others in her quest to uplift the lives of the economically and politically oppressed.  Hall worked on their behalf until the end of her life.

After graduating from Temple University in her hometown of Philadelphia in 1962 with a degree in Political Science, Hall could have enjoyed a comfortable middle-class life away from the pitfalls of the South. However, she longed to travel South after studying nonviolence techniques in high school and being arrested on Maryland's Eastern Shore as a junior in college for protesting discrimination.

Upon her arrival, Hall joined the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and worked with Charles Sherrod in Southwest Georgia. (1) She became one of the first female field leaders, although women played a pivotal role in the movement. She was stationed in Terrell County, known as Terrible Terrell, for the way it treated its majority black citizens, which included church burnings, death, and people of color missing for simply standing up for their rights. 

While working in Terrell County, Hall engaged in numerous activities while her life was in constant danger. For instance, she went from door to door registering voters, even in the crucial countryside, and helped citizens to pass voter registration tests at local freedom schools. As a result, "On September 6, 1962, night riders fired into the home where Hall and other activists were staying, wounding her, Jack Chatfield, and Christopher Allen." (2)

Although Hall faced gunshots and was jailed numerous times in Southwest Georgia, "including the notorious Sasser, Georgia jail," in Terrell County, she would not be deterred. (3) When Mount Olive Baptist Church in the Sasser community of Terrell County, which welcomed Civil rights Workers to its mass meetings, was burned to the ground in September of 1962, it bothered her deeply. During a commemorative ceremony on the church grounds, which included Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., she delivered a speech in which she repeated the phrase, "I have a dream," according to those in attendance. It inspired King, who used her words as the framework for his historic "I Have a Dream" speech in 1963 at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.

Hall also participated in the renowned Albany Movement (`1961-62) in the largest city of Southwest Georgia and home to historically black Albany State College, where SNCC was based.  Hall, including Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., encountered police chief Laurie Pritchett, who studied the concept of Non-Violence and used it against the protesters. He allowed the marches to proceed peacefully to not arouse national attention. Pritchett then calmly arrested large numbers of demonstrators and dispersed them to area detention centers to prevent his jail from filling up to break the back of the movement.

Although viewed by many as a setback, Hall and others saw their time in Albany as a teaching moment or what strategies could work best in the future. The city soon integrated as African Americans gained better housing, jobs, and education.

Hall was summoned to Selma, Alabama, a year later during a period of violence. Before her arrival, SNCC field secretary Bernard Lafayette was severely beaten and jailed. It all came to a head in 1965, when demonstrators, attempting to cross the Pettus Bridge on their way to Montgomery to dramatize discrimination, were savagely attacked by State patrolmen, known as Bloody Sunday. It profoundly affected Hall, who found it hard to believe people could be so cruel. 

Hall broke with SNCC at this time, which she felt had become militant. She endured dire times with the organization, which gave her the opportunity of a lifetime. Hall wrapped up business with friends and associates as she pondered her next move. 

After careful consideration, Hall returned North and earned a Master of Divinity, Master of Theology, and Ph.D. from Princeton Theological Seminary in New Jersey "after many years of wrestling with a calling to the ministry."(4) She became one of the first women ordained in the American Baptist Association, and served on the faculty of United Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio, "eventually becoming dean of African American Studies and director of the school's Harriet Miller Women's Center."(5)  In 1978, she assumed the role of pastor of Mt. Sharon Baptist in Philadelphia. 

Hall later served as a visiting scholar at the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, GA, and taught at Boston University School of Theology, holding the Martin Luther King Chair of Social Ethics, and focused on womanist theology. (6)) 

After a lengthy Hall passed away on April 12, 2002, in Boston, Massachusetts.  She was remembered as an exceptional orator, freedom fighter, and preacher who went out of her way to make life better for others. 

Sources: Historical records, Wikipedia

March on Washington Celebrates Sixty Years

The March on Washington highlighted changes the country needed to make on race that had yet to come to fruition during the hundred years since slavery.  It marked the first united front against injustice in the country's history.

A crowd of 250 thousand whites and blacks assembled near the Lincoln Memorial on August 28, 1963, for jobs and freedom. They witnessed speeches by activist and Freedom Rider John Lewis, the organizer  Byron Rustin, who put the government on notice, and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, who inspired everyone with his historic I Have A Dream Speech. Other brave leaders, such as Whitney Young, also took the podium.

A. Phillip Randolph, who had hoped for such a moment since the 1940s, ensured the march went off without a hitch while Mahalia Jackson graced the audience with her singing ability. Ossie Davis,  his wife Ruby Dee, and other celebrities were also on hand for the event. It propelled the burgeoning Civil Rights Movement to new heights as lifelong changes would come to pass. 

 President John F. Kennedy, who would be pressured to modify his stance on Civil Rights, and members of his cabinet watched from the sidelines as African Americans departed the gathering filled with hope and optimism for the future.

The timing could not have been better as the country was mired in Jim Crow in the South and deep-seated racism in the North.  A system of Sharecropping caused many blacks to live in abject poverty in the Southern States as scores of Northern blacks were confined to public housing with few job opportunities. Schools and other facilities south of the so-called Mason-Dixon Line and parts of the Midwest were still segregated despite Supreme Court rulings. 

The march and other crucial events accelerated the passage of the historic Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. People of color were no longer mandated to separate seating areas in restaurants or other establishments, for instance, or could receive care at any hospital. It also improved housing for blacks and quickened the process of school integration. 

Voting took center stage as African Americans participated in the elections of 1964 and '68 in record numbers. Black elected officials jumped from as little as 400 before then to as many as 4,000. Blacks packed voter registration offices in places like Americus, Georgia, and other rural communities that were ground zero in the fight for freedom.

Although the March on Washington intended to make changes that the country desperately needed, it endured heartbreaking challenges. A month after the march, four little black girls lost their lives in a church bombing in Birmingham, Alabama. It brought men and women of all races to their knees. Two years later, in 1965, black protestors attempting to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selman, Alabama, on their way to the state capitol in Montgomery, were beaten mercilessly by State officials in an incident that became known as Bloody Sunday.

In the decades since that historic day in Washington,  D.C., African Americans have enjoyed a standard of living their ancestors never dreamed possible in a nation smoldering with hate for its fellow man. Although there may be uncertainty about the future, many believe the best is yet to come.