Black U.S. Army soldier shot nearby in 1944 for resisting Jim Crow laws on a bus. Aftermath of killing helped revitalize North Carolina’s NAACP.
Topics Related to Activism
In May 1942 a group of 44 African American musicians broke U.S. Navy's color barrier, enlisting at general rank. Barracks were 1/4 mi. W.
Educator & civil rights activist. Chair, Education Dept., N.C. College for Negroes, 1948-1963. Her grave is nearby.
In 1947 the Congress of Racial Equality & local citizens, black & white, protested bus segregation. Setting out from Washington, D.C., "freedom riders" tested compliance with a U.S. Supreme Court ruling barring segregation on interstate buses. On April 13, riders arrived at local bus station then 20 yards west. A mob attacked one rider. Four others were arrested and sentenced to 30 days on chain gangs.
First African American female Episcopal priest; lawyer, activist, poet, & human rights champion. Wrote Proud Shoes, 1956. Childhood home ¼ mi. S.
Advocate for extending voting rights to women, 1920; reformer active in labor, race, Jewish causes. Home was here.
Newly freed people, 1866, rallied at Hammond’s Hill, here, for voting rights, fair wages, self-defense. Became early grassroots civil rights organization.
African American editor. Published Durham-based Carolina Times, 1927-71. An advocate of social justice and civil rights. Was born in Enfield.
Led by African American workers and civil rights coalition, 1978, against sanitation dept., here. It reshaped the labor movement in N.C.
Toxic waste illegally dumped along N.C. roads was moved to landfill 2 mi. E., 1982. Protests sparked environmental justice movement in U.S.