- Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was one of the main leaders of the American civil rights movement, a political activist, a Baptist minister, and is regarded as one of America's greatest orators. King's most influential and well-known public address is the "I Have A Dream" speech, delivered on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. in 1963. In 1964, King became the youngest man to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize (for his work as a peacemaker, … - Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks ( February 4 1913 a October 24 2005 ) was an African American civil rights activist whom the U.S. Congress later called "Mother of the Modern-Day Civil Rights Movement ". ... Rosa Parks was born Rosa Louise McCauley in Tuskegee , Alabama on February 4 , 1913 , to James McCauley and Leona Edwards , respectively a carpenter and a teacher, and was of African-American , Cherokee - Creek , [1] and Scots-Irish [2] ancestry. - John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy , also referred to as John F. Kennedy, Kennedy, John Kennedy, Jack Kennedy, or JFK, was the thirty-fifth President of the United States. In 1960 he became the youngest person ever to be elected President of the United States, and the second youngest, after Theodore Roosevelt, to serve. Kennedy served from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. - Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson, often referred to as LBJ, was the thirty-sixth President of the United States (1963–1969). After serving a long career in the U.S. Congress, Johnson became the thirty-seventh Vice President, and in 1963, he succeeded to the presidency following President John F. Kennedy's assassination. He was a major leader of the Democratic Party and as President was responsible for designing his Great Society, … - Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan (born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter, author, musician, and poet who has been a major figure in popular music for five decades. Much of Dylan's most recognized work dates from the 1960s, when he became an informal documentarian and a reluctant figurehead of American unrest. A number of his songs, such as "Blowin' in the Wind" and "The Times They Are a-Changin'", … - Emmett Till
Emmett Louis "Bobo" Till (July 25, 1941 - August 28, 1955) was an African-American teenager from Chicago, Illinois who died in what has been characterized as a "brutal murder" in a region of Mississippi known as the Mississippi Delta in the small town of Money in Leflore County. His murder was one of the key events that energized the nascent American Civil Rights Movement. The main suspects were acquitted but later admitted to committing the crime. - John Lewis
John Robert Lewis is an American politician and was an important leader in the American Civil Rights Movement. He was chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and played a key role in the struggle to end segregation. Lewis, a member of the Democratic Party, has represented Georgia's 5th Congressional District (map) in the United States House of Representatives since 1987. The district encompasses almost all of Atlanta. - Bayard Rustin
Bayard Rustin was an African-American civil rights activist, important largely behind the scenes in the civil rights movement of the 1960s and earlier and principal organizer of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. He counseled Martin Luther King, Jr. on the techniques of nonviolent resistance. Rustin was openly gay and advocated on behalf of gay and lesbian causes in the latter part of his career. - Marguerite Annie Johnson
Maya Angelou is hailed as one of the great voices of contemporary literature and as a remarkable Renaissance woman. A poet, educator, historian, best-selling author, actress, playwright, civil-rights activist, producer and director, Dr. Angelou continues to travel the world making appearances, spreading her legendary wisdom. A mesmerizing vision of grace, swaying and stirring when she moves, Dr. Angelou captivates her audiences lyrically with vigor, fire and perception. - Fannie Lou Hamer
Fannie Lou Hamer was an American voting rights activist and civil rights leader. She was instrumental in organizing Mississippi's "Freedom Summer" for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and later became the Vice-Chair of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, attending the 1964 Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in that capacity. - Eleanor Roosevelt
Anna Eleanor Roosevelt (October 11 1884 - November 7 1962) was an American political leader who used her influence as an active First Lady from 1933 to 1945 to promote the New Deal policies of her husband, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, as well as taking a prominent role as an advocate for civil rights. After her husband's death in 1945, she continued to be an internationally prominent author and speaker for the New Deal coalition. - Howard Zinn
Howard Zinn (born August 24, 1922) is an American historian, political scientist, social critic, activist and playwright, best known as author of the bestseller, "A People's History of the United States". Zinn's philosophy incorporates ideas from Marxism, anarchism, socialism, and social democracy. Since the 1960s, he has been active in the Civil Rights and anti-war movements in the United States. - James Meredith
James Howard Meredith (born June 25, 1933) is an American civil rights movement figure, although he vocally prefers "not" to be regarded as such. He was born in Kosciusko, Mississippi of Native American (Choctaw) and African American heritage. Meredith enlisted in the United States Air Force right out of high school and served from 1951 to 1960. He then attended Jackson State College for two years. He applied to the University of Mississippi, but was denied twice. - Roy Wilkins
Roy Wilkins (August 30, 1901 - September 8, 1981) was a prominent civil rights activist in the United States from the 1930s to the 1970s. Wilkins was active in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and between 1931 and 1934 was assistant NAACP secretary under Walter Francis White. When W. E. B. Du Bois left the organization in 1934, Wilkins replaced him as editor of "Crisis", the official magazine of the NAACP - Julian Bond
Julian Bond, president of the NAACP: "He was a polarizing figure in black America. He was hostile to the generally accepted remedies for discrimination. His appointments were of people as equally hostile. I can't think of any Reagan policy that African Americans would embrace." - Andrew Goodman
Andrew Goodman (November 23, 1943 - June 21, 1964) was an American civil rights activist who was murdered by gunshot in 1964 by members of the Ku Klux Klan. Andrew Goodman was born and raised on the Upper West Side of New York City, the middle of three sons of Robert and Carolyn Goodman, in a family and community steeped in intellectual and socially-progressive activism. - Fred Shuttlesworth
Fred Shuttlesworth (b. March 18, 1922) is a civil rights activist who led the fight against segregation and other forms of racism as a minister in Birmingham, Alabama and continues to work against racism and for alleviation of the problems of the homeless in Cincinnati, where he took up a pastorate in 1961. - Bull Connor
Theophilus Eugene "Bull" Connor (July 11 1897, Selma, Alabama - March 10 1973) was a Democratic police official in the Southern U.S. state of Alabama during the American Civil Rights Movement, a member of the Ku Klux Klan, and a staunch advocate of racial segregation. As the Public Safety Commissioner of Birmingham, Alabama, in the 1960s, Connor became a symbol of the fight against integration for using fire hoses and police attack dogs against unarmed, … - Martin Luther King Sr.
Reverend Martin Luther King, Sr. (December 19, 1899 - November 11, 1984) was a Baptist minister, an early civil rights leader and an advocate for social justice. He was also the father of American civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., who was born in 1929. The elder King (also known as 'Daddy King') led the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, and his personal example helped inspire Martin Luther King Jr. to enter the ministry. King Sr. - Dorothy Height
Dorothy Irene Height (born March 24, 1912) is an African American administrator, educator, and social activist. Irene Height is a recipient of the Congressional Gold Medal. Height was born in Richmond, Virginia. At an early age, she moved with her family to Rankin, Pennsylvania. While in high school, Height was awarded a scholarship to Barnard College for her oratory skills but upon arrival was denied entrance. - James Forman
James Forman (October 4, 1928 - January 10, 2005) was an African-American Civil Rights leader active in both the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Black Panther Party. - Jim Clark
James Gardner Clark, Jr. (September 17, 1922, Elba, Coffee County, Alabama - June 4, 2007) of Selma, Alabama, was the sheriff of Dallas County, Alabama from 1955 to 1966. He was one of the officials responsible for the violent arrests of civil rights protestors during the Selma to Montgomery marches. Clark served with the U.S. Army Air Force in the Aleutian Islands during World War II. - James Lawson
James M. Lawson (born September 22, 1928 in Uniontown, Pennsylvania) was a leading theoretician and tactician of nonviolence within the American Civil Rights Movement He continues to be active in training activists in nonviolence. - Hosea Williams
Hosea Lorenzo Williams (January 5, 1926 - November 16, 2000) was an United States civil rights leader, ordained reverend, and later a politician. His famous motto was "Unbought and Unbossed". - Sam Cooke
Sam Cooke (January 22, 1931 - December 11, 1964) was a popular and influential American gospel, R&B, soul, pop singer, songwriter, and entrepreneur. Indeed, musicians and critics today recognize him as one of the founders of soul music, and as one of the most important singers in soul music history (Greene, 2006). He has been called "the king of soul" by many, and while some may dispute this title, … - Phil Ochs
Philip David Ochs was a U.S. protest singer (or, as he preferred, a "topical singer"), songwriter, musician and recording artist who was known for his sharp wit, sardonic humor, earnest humanism, political activism, insightful and alliterative lyrics, and haunting voice. He wrote hundreds of songs in the 1960s and released eight LP record albums in his lifetime. He performed at many political events, anti-Vietnam War and civil rights rallies, student events, … - Charles Moore
Charles Moore was an American photographer who documented the Civil Rights Era. In 1958, while working in Montgomery, Alabama for the "Montgomery Advertiser", Moore photographed an argument between Martin Luther King, Jr. and two policemen. His photographs were distributed nationally by the Associated Press, and published in Life magazine. From this start, Moore traveled throughout the South documenting the Civil Rights Movement. - Joseph Lowery
Joseph Echols Lowery, (born October 6, 1921, in Huntsville, Alabama) is a minister and leader in the American civil rights movement. Lowery was pastor of the Warren Street United Methodist Church, in Mobile, Alabama from 1952 until 1961. After Rosa Parks' arrest in 1955, Lowery helped lead the Montgomery bus boycott. In 1957, with Martin Luther King, Jr. - Jimmie Lee Jackson
Jimmie Lee Jackson (December 1938 - February 26, 1965) was a young civil rights protestor who was killed by an Alabama State Trooper in 1965. Jackson's death was among the abuses of African Americans that provoked the Selma to Montgomery marches, an important event in the American Civil Rights movement. Jimmie Lee Jackson was born in Marion, Alabama. - Diane Nash
Diane Judith Nash was born on May 15, 1938 in Chicago was one of the founders of the SNCC, a key force in the American civil rights movement. - David Halberstam
David Halberstam was an American Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author known for his early work on the Vietnam War, his work on politics, history, business, media, American culture, and his later sports journalism. - Jim Wallis
The Reverend Jim Wallis (b. June 4 1948, Detroit, Michigan) is an Evangelical Christian writer and political activist, best known as the founder and editor of "Sojourners Magazine" and of the Washington, D.C.-based Christian community of the same name. Wallis actively eschews political labels, but his advocacy tends to focus on issues of peace and social justice, earning him his primary support from the religious left. - Big Six
The Big Six leaders during the height of the American Civil Rights movement are generally considered to be: * James Farmer-(January 12, 1920 – July 9, 1999) was a one of the leaders of the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. In 1942 Farmer founded the Congress of Racial Equality or CORE, a pacifist organization dedicated to achieving racial harmony and equality through non-violence. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1998, … - Ernest Green
Ernest G. Green (born September 22, 1941) was one of the Little Rock Nine, a group of African-American students who, in 1957, were the first black students ever to attend classes at Little Rock Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. Green, the eldest of the nine, was the first black to graduate from the school. In 1999, he and the other members of the Little Rock Nine were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal by President Bill Clinton. - Jo Ann Robinson
Jo Ann Gibson Robinson (1912-1992) was a civil rights activist and educator in Montgomery, Alabama. Born near Culloden, Georgia, she was the youngest of twelve children. She attended Fort Valley State College and then became a public school teacher in Macon, where she was married to Wilbur Robinson for a short time. Five years later, she went to Atlanta, where she earned an M.A. in English at Atlanta University. - James L. Farmer Jr.
James Leonard Farmer Jr., a Black civil rights activist who was one of the "big three" leaders of the American civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Born in Marshall, Texas in 1920, Farmer was an excellent student who skipped several grades in elementary school. After he completed high school at the age of fourteen he attended Wiley College with the idea of becoming a doctor but instead received his bachelors degree of science in chemistry in 1938. - Edgar Ray Killen
Edgar Ray (Preacher) Killen (born 17 January 1925) is an American former Ku Klux Klan organizer who conspired to kill several civil rights activists in 1964. He was found guilty of three counts of manslaughter on June 21, 2005, the forty-first anniversary of the crime. He appealed the verdict, but his punishment of 3 times 20 years in prison was upheld on the 12 January 2007 in a hearing by the Mississippi Supreme Court - Leonard Freed
Leonard Freed (1929 - November 29, 2006) was a documentary photojournalist and longtime Magnum member. Born into a humble Jewish family of East European extraction in Brooklyn, Freed attended the New School and studied with the legendary art director of Harper's Bazaar, Alexey Brodovitch. In 1967, Cornell Capa selected Freed as one of five photographers to participate in his "Concerned Photography" exhibition. His career blossomed during the American civil rights movement, … - Bernice Johnson Reagon
Bernice Johnson Reagon is a composer, singer, historian, and author specializing in African American oral, performance, and protest traditions. She is founder and artistic director of Sweet Honey in the Rock, for whom she has composed numerous works. She is a Distinguished Professor of History at American University, and Curator Emeritus at the Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of American History. - Amelia Boynton Robinson
Amelia Robinson was born in 1911 in Georgia, in a family of 10 children. Her father was a building contractor. She traces her history on both sides back to a mixture of African slaves, Cherokee Indians, and German and other European nobility. The account of the life of this rema rkabl e woman is given in the Bridge Across Jordan, published by the Schiller Institute in July1991.
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