Historians regard the Civil Rights of the 1960’s as one of the most important periods in the domestic history of the United States. For this reason it is appropriate that historic sites of the Civil Rights Movement be so marked in order to honor those who made the history and to educate all of our citizens.

Hattiesburg and Palmer’s Crossing (now part of municipal Hattiesburg) were important centers of the Civil Rights Movement in Mississippi, especially during Freedom Summer 1964. Hattiesburg was the largest Freedom Summer site in Mississippi, with over ninety volunteers from out of state, 3,000 local participants, and 650-675 Freedom School students.

The beginning of the efforts of Hattiesburg’s African American citizens to obtain full voting rights and economic opportunity can be dated to the return of World War II veterans in the 1940’s and to the continuing legal efforts of the Forrest County Chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). A period of international awareness began in the 1960’s when national civil rights organizations concentrated their efforts in Mississippi and other Southern states.

The Movement started in Hattiesburg with the arrival in March 1962 of two young African Americans from Pike County named Hollis Watkins and Curtis Hays. They were staff of the national civil rights organization the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), who had come to Hattiesburg to organize a voter registration campaign. They were housed by prominent African American businessman Vernon Dahmer, who would lose his life in 1966 when his home was fire-bombed. Also in the early 1960’s, Victoria Jackson Gray, a native of Palmer’s Crossing who grew up in Hattiesburg, began offering citizenship classes to local African Americans, using her textbooks, the Mississippi voter registration form, and the state Constitution.

In 1964, the Council of Freedom Organization (COFO), which included SNCC, the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), and the Mississippi chapters of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), launched the state-wide voter registration drive known as Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party. The U.S. Senate campaign headquarters of Victoria Jackson Gray were located at 507 Mobile Street. Nearby the Negro Masonic Lodge at 6th and Mobile Streets housed the Hattiesburg Minister Union.

Freedom Summer really began with the South’s first Freedom Day, January 22, in which hundreds of Forrest County African Americans residents, supported by out-of-state volunteers including fifty pastors from the National Council of Churches, stood all day in the rain waiting to enter the Forrest County Courthouse in order to attempt to register to vote. Demonstrations continued in front of the Courthouse throughout the Spring.
 
Freedom Summer Cast
In July and August 1964, while voter registration activities continued, COFO workers, volunteers, and local residents established Freedom Schools in seven African Americans churches-Bentley Chapel United Methodist Church, Morning Star Baptist Church, Mt. Zion Baptist Church, Priest Creek Missionary Baptist Church, St John’s United Methodist Church, St Paul United Methodist Church, and Truelight Baptist Church. Mass meetings were held at these churches and at St. James Christian Methodist Episcopal Church. Church members opened their homes to the volunteers, housing and feeding them at the risk of violence and economic reprisal.

The Freedom Schools offered classes in subjects like civics and Negro history which were not taught in the black public schools. Palmer’s Crossing Freedom School students authored the “Declaration of Independence” that was adopted at the statewide convention of Mississippi Freedom Schools held in Meridian in August in 1964 and included in the platform of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party that same year. There were so many students enrolled in the local Freedom Schools- an estimated 650-675-that the state Freedom School director, Dr. Staughton Lynd, professor of history at Yale University, called Hattiesburg “the Mecca of the Freedom School world.”

Theater and folksingers were also part of Freedom Summer. The Free Southern Theater, a touring repertory company starring among others Denise Nicholas, gave performances twice in Hattiesburg of plays like Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot and Ossie Davs’ Purlie Victorious. The Mississippi Caravan of Music, including legendary folk singer Pete Seeger, performed in Hattiesburg in support of African American rights.
Everything was filmed and taped and recorded by representatives of the American and Foreign press. The success of the Civil Rights Movement in the United States is attributed by historians directly to the awaking of the conscience of Americans who watched what happened in Mississippi on the nightly television news programs and read about their newspapers.

Now, on the Golden Anniversary of the historic Supreme Court case, Brown vs. Board of Education, one thought proves prophetic: “Those who refuse to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” What can we learn from the U.S. Civil Rights activism of the 1960’s? We can certainly glean great deal from the shifts of mind that are necessary for ordinary people to accomplish great things on a large scale.
The methods that emerged through the Civil Rights movements for transforming a well-entrenched system can offer powerful lessons to those seeking to change the hearts and minds of those around them. Civil Rights leaders used song, story, and dialog to involve Americans of all races in this historic struggle for social change.

As a native of Pick County, Mississippi, where it all began, I applaud the efforts of the 2003 Leaders for a New Century. Their current project – to mark the sites of Freedom Summer events via the Freedom Summer Driving Trail in the Hub City- will indeed honor those who made the history and educate all of our citizens.

It is our hope that the Hattiesburg High School production of Freedom Summer will help America, through the great diversity of it’s people, to renew its strength and spirit. We invite you to step into the midst of this ongoing human and civil rights dialogue, not just to learn from it, but also to contribute to it. 

Michael Marks
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The Hattiesburg High School production of Freedom Summer is dedicated to the 40th Anniversary of Freedom Summer.