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Show Friday Jan 19J007M Utah Statesman Campus News A long and difficult path to BY JKAN NASH JOHNSON The Dallas Mi oiling A'tir.v People throughout history helped pave the way for King and civil rights arlin Luther King Jr.: Tlie name is universal, etched into the American psyche. Ask any schoolchild and he probably can recite Dr. King's many civil rights accomplishments. But long before there was a March on Washington, a Memphis sanitation workers' strike, bus boycotts, sit-ins. freedom rides and an MLK holiday, champions not often found in U.S. history textbooks were making dieir own marks for freedom. Dating back to die pre„.-- - - ^ Revolutionary War period. slaver>'. abolition and die Jim Crow-era of segregadon, odier less-known Americans fought die good fight. Here is a celebration of centuries of unsung heroes who paved the way for die modem civil rights movement. Pre-1700s • When Lucas Vasquez de Ayllon moved from Spain to setde in what is now Jamestown. Va., he brought Africans widi him. He founded a colony dial thrived until the mid-1520s, when he died and was replaced by a more repressive leader. Africans fought die new regime, and many tied and established their own colony in Virginia. The 1700s • Crispus Attucks. a runaway slave, is believed to be the first American to die in the Revolutionary War. On March 5, 1770. Attucks was at the head of a crowd of rowdy Bostonians taunting British soldiers. He was believed to have provoked die attack by striking one of die soldiers. The soldiers shot Attucks and 10 other Americans, killing or fatally wounding five of them. • In 1730, 96 slaves aboard the ship Litde George gained control of the vessel from die crew. Some while crew members were thrown overboard, and odiers were sequestered. The Africans successfully navigated the ship back to Africa, where they escaped to freedom. \ • Elizabeth Freeman / / ^l^^fc (left), also known as Mumbel, was bom about 1742 and worked for Col. John Ashley, \ 1 ^ P ^ l •"'•*" M '' o n e °f Massachusetts' """ " wealthiest merchants. Her face was badly ./^cv^'- '. scarred when she look a - - -" blow from a hot kitchen shovel intended for her sister. Freeman later lied the Ashley house, vowing never lo return. Col. Ashley attempted to recover her legally, but Freeman sought help from attorney Theodore Sedgwick, insisting that she could argue for her freedom. The law said that all were born free and equal, and she said she was certainly included. Sedgwick look the case and won. The jury even awarded Freeman damages. Her case set die precedent in Massachusetts diat die Bill of Rights in fact abolished slavery. The 1800s • Black nationalist Henry Highland Garnet was one of die more militant anli-slavery leaders in the early 19th century. Along widi Frederick Douglass, he was a major player in die abolitionist movement He argued in 1864 at die National Convention of Colored Citizens in Syracuse, N.Y., dial black people should be equal to ; whites and live separately. He had said j diis to one resistance group: "Brcdircn ' arise, arise. Strike for your lives and liberties. Now is die day and die hour: Let every slave diroughout die land do this, and die days of slavery are numbered." • On July 2, 1839, die most famous slaveship rebellion took place aboard die Spanish vessel La Amislad. While the ship was transporting captured Africans along die Cuban coast, die slaves, led by Joseph Cinque, tried unsuccessfully to redirect the ship to Africa. The USS Washington captured die ship, and die slaves were taken lo New London. Conn. The mutiny ease went before the U.S. Supreme Court, where Cinque and his fellow Africans were represented by former President John Quincy Adams and won the right lo return lo Africa. /••'' • In the mid-1800s, Harriet Tubman was one of die formidable conductors of die Underground Railroad, die system dial helped slaves, mostly in the South, escape to freedom. Tubman was die most famous, but other blacks and whites \ \ played pivotal roles in die system's success. Levi Coffin, a Quaker, helped nearly 2,000 runaway slaves, and Washington, D.C., cab operator Leonard Grimes used his cab not only to taxi wealthy whites, but also to carry slaves to freedom. Tubman was never captured, but Grimes was apprehended on one of his trips to Virginia and spent two years in prison in Richmond. Coffin and odier whites who risked dieir lives were rarely arrested. • Abraham Lincoln called author Harriet Beecher Stowe die little woman who started die Civil War. Widi die publication of her "Uncle Tom's Cabin" in 1852, she denounced slavery widi her sympadietic portrayal of die slave Uncle Tom. Her characterization of Tom as a human being set off a new attitude among Northerners toward slaves. The book became a play, which loured die North. • John Brown (below) is one of the most widely known white abolitionists. He believed he was sent by God to abolish slavery. Widi funding from New England anti-slavery organizations, he and his followers raided several of Virginia's established plantations. In 1859, widi fewer dian 50 men, he raided an arsenal at Harpers Ferry. Va., to get ammunition to level an attack on Virginia slave owners. He was captured by Robert H. Lee and hanged after a trial, where he was convicted (if "treason, conspiracy and advising slaves and odiers to rebel and ^, ..^ murder in die first degree." Brown was urged by his lawyer to plead insanity, but he refused. Of die five blacks who also , were caught, two were killed 1 fighting U.S. troops, two were ! hanged, and one escaped. / t In 1800, Denmark Vesey wa.s allowed to buy his freedom for die $600 he won in a Charleston, S.C., street lottery. The West-Indian-born Vesey was familial- widi die Haitian slave revolt of the 1790s and became dissatisfied widi liis second-class citizenship. He also was aware dial others widi no freedom were worse off. In 1822, a frustrated Vesey planned an uprising of city and plantation blacks. / The plan was recorded as the most extensive slave revolt in U.S. history, calling for the radicals to seize guardhouses and arsenals. lake arms; kill all whites, bum and destroy Charleston and subsequently free the slaves. Though it is a disputed figure, it was believed that 6X)00 to 9.000 blacks were involved. A black house servant warned white authorities of die insurrection plan, and because of die massive military preparations to counterattack, Vesey's plan remained stalled for two months. During diat period, 130 blacks were arrested, and in die trials that followed, 67 were convicted of an attempted insurrection. Vesey was among about 35 of that number hanged. Four white men also were sent to prison for encouraging the plot. • Many students of black history are familiar with the great abolitionist Sojourner Truth, a popular speaker in die 1840s during die revival movement in die Northeast. Her folk manner and wry humor were disarming to many anti-abolitionists. What is probably not as well-known is Sojourner Truth's active role in equal rights for women. In die 1850s. she was one of the first black women to participate in the women's rights movement. During one speech on women's rights, a man questioned her gender and she bared her breast at great embarrassment to him. • Pennsylvania abolitionist and physician Martin Delaney (below) was one of die few educated blacks of his time, and he used his intellect to launch a militant opposition lo slavery. In the 1840s he started a weekly newspaper, the Mystery, which printed grievances of American blacks and also championed women's rights. The newspaper had an outstanding reputation, and its stories often were reprinted in die mainstream while press. In the late 1840s, Delaney worked widi abolitionist leader Frederick Douglass in Rochester, , N.Y., where they published anolh• er weekly, die North Star. Delaney also was one o( die .' first blacks to be admitted to Harvard Medical School. He later / helped recruit troops for die renowned Civil War 54tii Massachusetts Volunteers, which he served as a surgeon. In February 1865, die doctor was made a major, die first black man to receive a regular Army commission. The 1900s • There's no disputing Booker T. Washington's place in black history. But his behind-the-scenes operating style is not as commonly known. For instance, on Oct. 16, 1901, President Teddy Roosevelt broke widi segregationists and invited die black leader to dine at die White House. This infuriated Soutiiern whites but created pride in die black community, in spite of opposition among some black Americans to Washington's moderate style. Washington did not favor public political resistance by blacks, but he constantly defended black social and political rights. He secretly helped finance efforts lo end discrimination on Pullman railroad cars, and he contributed money lo lawyers who I fought to overturn Texas and ; Alabama laws diat excluded blacks from participating injuries. '. • Trade unionist and civil rights leader Asa Philip Randolph (right) was a strategic champion of fair labor practices for blacks. In die early 1910s, he and activist Chandler Owen organized an employment agency for black workers. In 1917, the two started The Messenger, a magazine that called for more positions in die war industry and the armed forces for blacks. Randolph also established die Brodierhood of Sleeping Car Porters and began organizing black workers groups. (Half die affiliates of the American Federation of Labor barred blacks.) When Randolph warned President Franklin D. Roosevelt dial he would lead thousands in a protest march on Washington, die president issued an executive order June 25, 1941, diat barred discrimination in defense indus- tries and federal bureaus and created the Fair Employment Practices Committee. After World War II, Randolph established die League lor Nonviolent Civil Disobedience Against Military Segregation, which resulted in an executive order by President Harp,' S. Truman banning segregation in the armed forces. The seed planted in 1941 led Randolph to help lead the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on Aug. 28. 1963. • Social activist and writer Mary Church Terrell (right) was co-founder and lirsl / president ol' die National Association of Colored Women, founded in 1896. Terrell was an advocate for women's suffrage and blacks' rights. As a member of die integrated National American Woman Suffrage Association, she particularly '"" ' fought for die concerns of black women. She was named to ihe District of Columbia Board of Education in 1895, the first black woman to hold such a position. At die suggestion of W.E.B. Du Bois, she was made a charter member o( the NAACP. In her final act as activist. Terrell led a successful three-year fight to end segregation in public eating places and hotels in Washington, • Newspaper editor and activist Charlotta Spears Bass argued so boldly for civil rights diat many believed she was ahead of her time. Her influential words and style were later used in die early days of die 1950s-"60s civil rights movement. When she became editor in 1912 oi die California Eagle, the oldest black Wesl Coast paper in the country, die paper directed its focus to political and social issues important to its constituency. The paper often wrote about unfair treatment of blacks in education, employment and politics. In doing so, Bass had to face down a strong Ku Klux Klan presence in California in die '40s and '50s. She later went into politics, and in 1952 she became die first black woman to run for vice president campaigning for the Progressive Party. • In the 1940s, aclor/adilete Paul Robeson epitomized the use of celebrity influence against racism. The Rutgers graduate was best known for his dynamic tiieater portrayals in Eugene O'Neill's 'The Emperor Jones" and "All God's Chillun Got Wings." and Shakespeare's "Othello." He stirred his greatest controversy in ihe late *40s when he publicly denounced U.S. policy against die Soviet Union, proclaiming diat blacks would not light against a government that was free of racism and prejudice. He was blackballed from acting and targeted by the U.S. government He was not granted a passport. He also was stripped of his honors as an athlete. His name was removed from the list of All-Americans for die i years he played for Rutgers, and he \ was refused membership in die •) College Football Hall of Fame. Robeson never relented and insist: ed that he had the right to free speech against racism in America. • It was die vision and influence of Ella Baker, executive director of die Southern Christian Leadership Conference, that led to die creation o( the pivotal Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. Baker organized die group in 1960, insisting thai students needed a voice and organization of dieir own. In a '60s climate of rising black anger, die committee criticized the conference and odier groups such as the Congress of Racial Equality for their lack of immediate leadership in black communities, and it later spun off, offering a more direct small-group approach lo community involvement The group elected Stokely Carmichael as its leader in 1966. He coined the phrase "black power" and led the group away from its original commitment to integration and toward the goal of separate community building. MARTY WESTMAN/MCT |