Medgar Evers (1925-1963), a martyr of the American civil rights movement, died 50 years ago today on June 12th 1963. He was the head of the NAACP in Mississippi, the most racist state in the nation.
When he was boy growing up in Mississippi a friend of the family was lynched. His bloody clothes hung on a fence for a year. No one said a word about it – not in the newspapers, not at church, nowhere. On Saturday nights whites would try to run down blacks with their cars for sport or go through town beating them up.
At 17 Evers left high school to join the army. He fought for America in the Second World War against the racist Nazis to free France and Germany.
When he and his brother came back from war, they registered to vote. But on voting day 200 armed whites blocked their way. Evers knew that if he did nothing, there would be no better world for his children. So he joined the NAACP. He got his high school and college degrees and by 1954 he was the head of the NAACP for the whole state.
The NAACP took the quiet, slow lawyerly approach of fighting for equal rights for blacks by doing it in court. So when James Meredith, for example, could not get into the University of Mississippi (Ole Miss) because he was black, Evers arranged to fight it in court with the help of Thurgood Marshall.
But Evers went beyond that approach. He staged protests to fight the Jim Crow laws that kept blacks out of restaurants, libraries and even parks. He staged boycotts of white businesses that supported Jim Crow. He pushed to get as many blacks registered to vote as possible despite the laws whites passed to make it hard for them to vote.
His biggest enemy, though, was black fear, the fear that kept blacks from fighting for change. His biggest weapon was his own courage, courage that allowed him to stand up to whites despite all the death threats, despite the firebomb thrown at his house, despite being one of the blacks that whites in the Deep South most wanted dead.
On the evening of June 11th 1963 just before midnight Evers came back from a late-night meeting. He got out of his car carrying T-shirts that said, “Jim Crow Must Go”. In the bushes nearby someone shot him in the back. He fell forward. He crawled to the door, his keys still in his hand. His wife heard the shot and ran to the door. She found him at the steps, face down in blood. His three children shouted, “Daddy, get up!”
The neighbours came running. Some of them were white. When Mrs Evers saw her white neighbours, in that moment she wanted to take a machine gun and gun them all down.
And that was the turning point for Mississippi, the moment when anger overcame fear. In that moment change in Mississippi and throughout the Jim Crow South became unstoppable.
See also:
- James Meredith
- Emmett Till
- Fannie Lou Hamer
- Selma
- The Help
- Jim Crow
- Aung San Suu Kyi
- other black leaders shot dead:
- songs inspired by Medgar Evers’s death:
The recent film about the trial of Evers’s murderer, Ghost of Mississippi, is a perfect example of “white washed” history and of history with whites as the good guys, as touched on in yesterday’s blog posting here. Ghost of Mississippi makes it look like only the white community cared about Evers’s death, and at the same time, only the white community faced violence. It is so frustrating because it is so misleading and does little to actually honor anyone. Evers was indeed very important to the modern movement in Mississippi.
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A South politician preaches to the poor white man
“You got more than blacks, don’t complain
You’re better than them, you been born with white skin” they explain
And the Negro’s name
Is used it is plain
For the politician’s gain
As he rises to fame
And the poor white remains
On the caboose of the train
But it ain’t him to blame
He’s only a pawn in their game.
The deputy sheriffs, the soldiers, the governors get paid
And the marshals and cops get the same
But the poor white man’s used in the hands of them all like a tool
He’s taught in his school
From the start by the rule
That the laws are with him
To protect his white skin
To keep up his hate
So he never thinks straight
‘Bout the shape that he’s in
But it ain’t him to blame
He’s only a pawn in their game
Oh, Bob Dylan’s song was describing the Republican Party of 2013? Just add Mexicans to “Negroes.”
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This man needs to be in our history books too.
Do you have reason to doubt that it was Byron De La Beckwith?
Anyhow, I just read about the timeline of De La Beckwith — his kids would have been the age of my older cousins in Greenwood, MS – they probably were schoolmates.
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If i may say so myself (many may disagree with me), Mississippi was by far the worst state for Blacks to be in…but now well…Chokwe Lumumba has just been elected mayor of Jackson. Jackson State University has a partnership with Africana Studies programs in Africa..and not to mention the dozens of African-Centered private and charter schools throughout the state.
I don’t know what the future holds, but i do know that Mississippi is starting to look a lot like The Republic of New Afrika–at least for the Black communities.
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It was La Beckwith.
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I never knew the story of Megar Evers before today. I knew he was a civil rights leader and was killed but didn’t know the details. Amazing man.
I must admit, I’ve always been a little afraid to go to Mississippi. For a trip to Memphis my husband booked a hotel in a nearby town in Mississippi. I was pretty much a suburb of Memphis and pretty nice.
Peanut,
“Black people there look just like West Africans”
What else would they look like?
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@solesearch, was it Olive Branch or Southhaven (the suburb)?
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Abagond wrote:> > > > > a:hover { color: red; } > a { > text-decoration: none; > color: #0088cc; > } > > a.primaryactionlink:link, a.primaryactionlink:visited { background-color: #2585B2; color: #fff; } > a.primaryactionlink:hover, a.primaryactionlink:active { background-color: #11729E !important; color: #fff !important; } > >/* > @media only screen and (max-device-width: 480px) { > .post { min-width: 700px !important; } > } >*/ > > WordPress.com > > > > > > > > > > > abagond posted: ” > >Medgar Evers (1925-1963), a martyr of the civil rights movement, died 50 years ago today on June 12th 1963. He was the head of the NAACP in Mississippi, the most racist state of all. > >When he was boy growing up in Mississippi a friend of the family ” > > > > > >
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@ peanut
I visited Biloxi Mississippi with my family a couple years ago it was nice, but then again we were at an army base, and the ppl there seemed ok. I just liked the beach. I wouldn’t want to live in mississippi the history is too crazy for me to want to be there. And that black man that was killed by those teenages there is too recent, for me to feel safe there.
My uncle lives in north Carolina it is beautiful there and peaceful we passed through south Carolina on the way there and for some reason their gas is cheap. And I have family in Pennsylvania it’s a lot of hills there lol and I passed through Hershey Pennsylvania and there were light poles shaped like Hershey kisses, felt like willy wonka and the chocolate factory.
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Excellent post for such a brave and proud brotha.
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I love this quote from Myrlie Evers-Williams. “Jim Crow is alive,and it’s dressed in a Brooks Brothers suit,my friend,instead of a white robe. Very true words.
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Mississippi is still a very racist state.
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This is why we as black people, need to spend out time, educating out young black youth about black men and women, like Medgar everers.
Schools across the country in America, don’t teach black,white or brown children about all the Black Civil rights activists.
medgar is a very obscure figure, in the Civil rights movement, compared to Martin Luther King Jr. This shouldn’t be the case.
I don’t expect white people to begin to start….
We have the power and tools today, to teach ourselves and our children about our true history with the internet and social media as our platform.
We as black people, don’t harness the internet like we should, instead of spending time on sites like, “worldstar.com”and “YouTube” to watch people do stupid things, we should use it to educate each other and our children.
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@Sondis
I heard about Medgar Evers but I didn’t know how he impacted the Civil Rights Movement until I read this post. So sad he died but he didn’t die in vain. He died so that me and you had the right to vote, go to the same schools as Whies etc. Although my parents came from Jamaica and I was born here, I still care about the Black struggle here in America, past and present.
Yes I am a apart of the current generation of Black youth and you could tell from some of my immature replies on here(lol) but I do love this blog. This blog is a good blog for me and other Blacks to express our feelings about racism and learn more about our culture.
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Check out this video, people.
( http://youtu.be/g7Hc_RTo0yE )
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It is here where we can clearly see how far the snow and sand have covered the fields of history. Men and Women getting swallowed up whole like old wooden ships. We must be divers, archaeologist, detectives, and truth finders. I always feel giddy with a find like this thanks Abagond.
If I hear the Greatest Generation I sometimes feel anger because the fuel of racism it heat was brightest in those days of their youth. (By no means does it imply that it is over because we all know embers are great to cook with.) Yet, then I remember my own family was alive back then taking on the brunt of it. Living, Breathing and surviving in the swill that surrounded them trying to extinguish their voices.
Thank you Medgar Evers you truly deserve the title of the Greatest Generation and I for one shall not forget it.
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Mighty Medgar Evers. He is the definition of a courageous man. His life story was a great one. Thank you Abagond for sharing this brief history of his life.
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Notice that Medgar Evans, Malcolm X, MLK, Jr. all were shot and killed at about the same age?
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“At 17 Evers left high school to join the army. He fought for America in the Second World War against the racist Nazis to free France and Germany.
When he and his brother came back from war, they registered to vote. But on voting day 200 armed whites blocked their way. ”
I never understood why black people joined the American military and fought wars for such a racist country. Defending a people, a nation, a culture, and a “way of life” that hates you??!?! Doesn’t make any sense.
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It also offers a job and a chance for some more education.
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^ and it doesn’t hurt to get to see other parts of the world.
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i’ll always picture whoopi as medgar’s wife. she actually did a very good job in the role.
what a man of character. God bless him.
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my grandpa lived in mississippi for a time during the 1940s, working out there (i’m white, he was white). he had to leave the place, he said the way people acted there was just plain evil, he didn’t know how people could be so hateful. he would legitimately be in a bar having a drink and some guys would say “let’s go kill us a nigger” and march out the door. like they were gonna throw darts or something. jesus. i don’t even know what to call it. i don’t know what could make someone like that.
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@ Sondis
You know why they only teach Dr. King don’t you? Because he practiced the most subtle form of resistance and preached peace. This is why Malcolm X or The Black Panthers are rarely taught. You see how Arizona treated the history of Mexicans in this country, didn’t you? They literally took away all academic opportunities to be taught about the struggles of the Mexican people in America for K-12 education.
And just last year you had the tea party trying to have references to slavery removed from history text books so as not to cast the founding fathers in a “bad light.” They want to refer to the Atlantic Slave Trade as the “Atlantic Triangular Trade” and want slavery to be disregarded because it was the “context of the time.”
They don’t want to teach you about our heroes, because White America fears that if we learn that our leaders rose up for peace and freedom only to be met with assassination, that we will become angered at White America. That’s why they took away Mexican American studies That is why they are trying to remove slavery from the history books. That is why we don’t get enough attention to heroes like Medgar Evers.
But I agree with you on the matter of teaching our own youth. I learned about DuBois, Garvey, Douglas, Turner, Newton, Seale, X and many other figures because my parents took the time to teach me. They bought a history text book called “The African American Experience: A History.” Everyday after school I had to read half a chapter and write a report and submit it to my father. I used to hate doing it, but in retrospect I am very grateful.
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Sondis, black children should be required to learn about civil rights leaders the same way they have to learn all the U.S. presidents and states.
Unfortunatley, we have no institutions to enforce this. Well, we do have the black church, but sadly civil rights and improving the black community doesn’t seem to be on their radar any longer.
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Not only black children need to learn, but all Americans. This history belongs to all Americans and the whole world for that matter.
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@ jefe
You hit the nail on the head. For the time being, because White America is obscuring the contributions and struggles of non-Whites, it is up to us to teach ourselves. However, the goal shouldn’t be one in which we teach ourselves our history. We need to get to a place in which our history is recognized as a valid part of the history of this nation.
Why do we learn about George Washington but never James Armistead? We learn about General Sherman but never the Buffalo Soldiers. We are rendered invisible throughout the history of this nation, even though we have been there at every step and fought in every conflict, including the Revolutionary War.
Because of that invisibility, the extent of our participation in this society always revolves around our oppression. Our period as slaves, our fight for civil rights. But never about our fights to be Americans or to defend America. It leaves Black children feeling as though we have done nothing to be proud of and enforces the belief that White people have done everything. Black history IS American history.
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Not just black and white history, but we also need to learn about Native American history (not just that they died off because they had no resistance to European diseases), Asian American history (not simply that they are perpetual foreigners), Mexican-American history (the history of the SW did not start with the Alamo), the Philippine-American war, etc.
These too are all American history.
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The film Ghost of Mississippi. Just left me wanting. It just seemed incomplete to me. I felt the film didn’t do justice to Medgar Evers.
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[…] Medgar Evers (1925-1963), a martyr of the American civil rights movement, died 50 years ago today on June 12th 1963. He was the head of the NAACP in Mississippi, the most racist state in the nation… […]
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Medgar Evans turned over in his grave yesterday.
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Sorry, I mean Medgar Evers.
After all the current remaining problems in voter disenfranchisement, and how Congress voted it in, how could the SCOTUS rule against it?
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Meadger Evers said: “I was born in Mississippi, and I will die in Mississipi!” Some of the comments I have read here only reinforces why I am so adamant about proper history being taught. Some say I am “racist” because I want blacks to know their history.
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@ Karen: You are on the money, black Americans do need to learn our history.
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[…] Medgar Evers (1963) – Byron De La Beckwith, white, was not convicted till 1994. Died in prison. […]
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If we people of color have anything good about our lives today, it’s because of Medgar Evers and others like him who sacrificed their lives to fight racism. I think he even said that he didn’t mind dying if it would give his children a better world than the one he lived in. Every American should definitely know who he is.
One of my favorite things about him was how everyone was too afraid to investigate Emmit Till’s murder and Medgar wouldn’t accept the injustice of it so he and his helpers dressed up as field hands and went undercover interviewing witnesses.
I found out about Medgar because my white high school U.S. history teacher suggested I choose his wife Myrlie Evers Williams for an assignment on notable American women.
I agree with others on here that it is so so important that people learn about all Americans in school during U.S. history. It just disempowers us people of color that we don’t have any explanation for why our lives are the way they are until we are adults and have access to classes on our ethnic group’s history at community college. It was just sad how my dad would take my textbooks on Mexican American history to read when he was already in his 60s, and my grandmother in her 70s asked me all interested what they taught in my Mexican American history class. She died without getting to learn her own history.
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I just went through the contents and quizzes of a book recommended for use to prepare for the US history Advanced Placement exam. You find that all this stuff is still MISSING, and the story is told from a white Anglo-American perspective.
Do you think that there is any chance of lobbying them to revise the Advanced Placement history exam? By getting them to include stuff in their test, maybe the books used to prepare for that test will include some of that stuff.
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Reblogged this on Project ENGAGE.
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