Tuten 1

Kassandra TutenDr. RobinsHistoriography1May 2014

Militant Femmes: Female SNCC Activism and the Southwest Georgia Project

Between the years 1961-1964, as African Americans sought to

establish themselves with rights denied to them by white America,

the United States became a battleground. During this time,

millions of black Americans took to the streets in an attempt to

rid themselves from the yoke of Jim Crow culture, an ethos that

was rooted in de jure and de facto segregation of the African

American population. This resulted in the emergence of a formal

albeit diversified movement for African American civil rights

Although many would argue that this was often formally led by

‘outside agitators’ from various larger cities and organizations,

this movement was really a people’s movement. At the heart of

this movement were local female activists. This essay surveys the

existing historiography of the Southwest Georgia Movement and

identifies primary source evidence revealing women’s activism. In

so doing, the goal is not to ‘fit’ women into a field, but rather

to create a unique and cohesive scholarship in which the active

Tuten 2

and diverse participation of women within the movement is

highlighted and brought out of the shadows.

These women, ranging in age depending on the location of the

project, were local members or sympathizers of the Student Non-

Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) who increasingly sought to

establish their presence within the movement in a plethora of

ways. SNCC, an organization founded in 1960 as a result of an

African American youth sit-in movement, allowed for unique

opportunities for both men and women. The organization sent local

youth leaders to southern communities in an attempt to combat Jim

Crow through methods such as voter registration and the

establishment of Freedom Schools.1 However important these

institutions may have been to the larger movement, one must not

ignore local women’s willingness to act as front-line soldiers in

marches and protests, their willingness to face prison time, tear

gas, water hoses, and police brutality, and their willingness to

confront sexual harassment. It was these experiences which made

female involvement in the Southwest Georgia movement so unique. 1 “Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Sit-In Movement, 1960” in Let Nobody

Turn Us Around: An African American Anthology, pp. 371-372 (Maryland:Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2009), 371.

Tuten 3

The roots of black female public activism can be found in

the shared experiences of suffering under racial oppression.

While black men and black women experienced some differences

under slavery and later Jim Crow, the collective experience of

race-based discrimination also allowed black women opportunities

to speak out in important ways. This tradition of black female

activism further culminated in the extensive and diverse role

they played in the local Civil Rights movement between the years

1961-1964.

            Although Jim Crow was a national experience, its

grasp on society and the legal system was far stronger in the

southern region. Of particular importance to a study of the

southern Civil Rights experience, however, is that of the

protestors in the rural regions, particularly in oft-forgotten

Georgia. Scholars have identified the challenges of the Albany

Movement of 1961, a movement which gained national attention

because of the brief presence of Martin Luther King, Jr, but

rural areas have received less attention. White SNCC activist

John Perdew described the surrounding counties of Sumter, Lee,

Tuten 4

and Terrell as the “stepchild[ren] of the New South.”2 SNCC

maintained a presence in the region but protest activities were

ultimately led by local youth who risked everything, including

the well-being of their families and themselves, to dismantle

white supremacy within their region. It was also within the

confines of ‘Lamentable Lee County,’ ‘Terrible Terrell County,’

and Sumter County that local women were able to further

understand the nature of their femininity as well as establish

their authority within the broader community. Therefore, as black

men sought to distance themselves from the derogatory category of

‘boy’ instilled on them by their white male counterparts, black

women began to assert themselves in an increasing manner, often

taking on the mantle of responsibility, a task which often

brought them into direct contact with billyclubs, hostile police

officers, Klansmen, and a wide variety of other obstacles.

The beginning of the (formal) SW GA Civil Rights Movement

can be traced to 1961. In October of that year, SNCC members

Charles Sherrod and Cordell Reagon arrived in Albany in hopes of

2 Stephen G. N. Tuck, Beyond Atlanta: The Struggle for Racial Equality in Georgia, 1940-1980

(Georgia: The University of Georgia Press, 2001), 159.

Tuten 5

establishing a voter registration campaign after the passage of

the Civil Rights Act of 1957, the first civil rights legislation

passed since the period of Reconstruction.3 Although many of

Albany’s residents were reliant on white employment, particularly

those engaged in agriculture, domestic work, and education, there

was a larger minority of ‘elite blacks’ in Albany than in any of

the surrounding counties. These peoples, along with other

important avenues, most notably local black churches, the high

schools, and, increasingly, Albany State, an all-black college

located near downtown Albany, allowed for greater opportunities

for organization.4 It was from these institutions and with the

“militancy of the younger people”5 that the Albany Movement was

able to discover its organizational and participatory backbone:

local female African American youth.

In contrast to the Americus movement, which would officially

emerge in 1963 and was overwhelmingly reliant on the activism of

young women aged eleven to sixteen, the Albany movement was

3 “Southwest Georgia Project.” Submitted to the Coordinating Committee of SNCC on 27 Dec.

1963.4 “SNCC Newsletter,” 1962.5 Ibid., 1962.

Tuten 6

spearheaded by a slightly older group of women. Of particular

importance to the efforts of the diverse Albany movement were

women who were enrolled in Albany State.6

To begin to piece together an understanding of the

involvement of women, it is imperative to begin with an

evaluation of female involvement as depicted in the media. When

one examined media coverage of the Albany movement, women are

seldom mentioned in any great detail. While there are massive

catalogues of newspaper articles from various sources which,

combined, paint a rather clear picture of the events which

occurred in Albany during the 1960s, very few devoted themselves

to coverage of events in which women played a predominant role.

Instead, many articles, some of which are included in the

anthology Reporting Civil Rights Part One: American Journalism 1941-1963,

offered clear depictions of SNCC’s goals, the Jim Crow culture of

segregation throughout the South (including SW GA), as well as

the ‘defeat’ of King, Jr. at the hands of Albany’s Chief of

Police, Laurie Pritchett. Throughout the entire collection, only

a small percentage depicted events which occurred in SW GA during6 Howard Zinn, SNCC: The New Abolitionists (Massachusetts: Beacon Press, 1964), 125.

Tuten 7

the formal years of the Civil Rights Movement. An even smaller

percentage, two to be specific, detailed the experiences of

Albany female natives. Between the two events, one is better able

to understand the diverse role women played in the movement,

whether it be through direct activism such as the first example,

or through providing support and at the same time risking one’s

own personal well-being as in the case of the second.

The first event which was discussed involved the arrest of

eighteen-year-old Ola Mae Quarterman. According to the trial

which eventually proceeded, Quarterman was arrested not only for

failing to remove herself from the front seat of a bus, but “for

using ‘obscene’ language” when she defended herself and her

position to the bus driver by stating that she had “paid [her]

damn twenty cents, and [thus could] sit wher[ever]” she wanted.7

Quarterman, then, had fallen victim to both a racist and

patriarchal society. Not only had her color dictated to the

social order that her proper place was behind her white

7 Reporting Civil Rights Part One: American Journalism 1941-1963 (New York: The Library of

America, 2003), 705.

Tuten 8

counterparts, but her gender also established a different lens

through which her actions were to be viewed.8

The second case discussed involved Mrs. Marion King, the

wife of movement leader Slater King. On 23 July 1962, Mrs. King,

along with a larger group of women, drove from Albany to

neighboring Mitchell County, seeking to deliver items to a group

of young girls who had been arrested during a march to City Hall

and were being held there. After being accosted by a group of

white officers stationed outside the prison, the group of women,

practicing the SNCC model of non-aggression, quietly and calmly

began to leave the compound. Being the wife of a renowned

movement leader, Mrs. King was identified from the other women of

the group and immediately harassed by the prison guards. After

cursing at her and threatening to arrest her, Mrs. King “turned

and said, ‘If you want to arrest me, go ahead.’ She was then

kicked, hit twice on the side of the head and was knocked

unconscious.”9 Mrs. King was five (or six according to some

sources) months pregnant at the time of her assault, and because

of the trauma she suffered at the hands of the officer, she 8 Ibid., 705.9 Reporting Civil Rights, 707.

Tuten 9

miscarried.10 Though Mrs. King is slightly older than the target

group of involved females, her story, as well as its renown (it

was mentioned in a number of SNCC produced reports as well as in

John Lewis’s speech at the March on Washington) clearly

illuminated the persistent and unique dangers that were present

for movement activists of the female sex, as well as the length

many women were willing to go in order to gain some semblance of

freedom from the oppressive system of Jim Crow.

As noted before, women’s involvement in the movement was

less often reported in national news. This trend continued,

however, into the weekly newsletters and updates composed by

local SNCC leaders. These briefs, designed to inform the national

offices of progress and setbacks within the organization’s

projects, tended to be male-centric. This is no surprise in that

many of the local leaders in charge of writing these newsletters

were male. However limited, the actions of women participants was

more readily discussed within these newsletters than they were in

the local and national media, whether white or black owned. It is

important to note, however, that, although women were mentioned

10 “Southwest Georgia Project,” 7.

Tuten 10

in greater detail in the SNCC newsletters, their role, as

dictated by the presence of their activities within the reports,

was relegated to an inferior status. While their contributions to

the movement did not go entirely unnoticed, they, according to

the records displayed within the pages, played a seemingly minor

role.11

Although they were often relegated to a supporting role

throughout SNCC’s Albany project newsletters, it is interesting

to note that the information that has been preserved through

these papers depicted the unique challenges that female activists

faced in the struggle for civil rights. Of particular importance

to this discussion was a work entitled “Southwest Georgia

Project.” Submitted to the Coordinating Committee on 27 December

1963, the paper, nearly thirty pages in its entirety,

chronologically detailed the events which had occurred in SW GA

from the arrival of Sherrod and Reagon in 1961 until the paper’s

submission in 1963. In essence, the work served as a time capsule

in which was placed a chronology of events within the region as

SW GA became ground zero for revolution. This chronology was

11 “Southwest Georgia Project.”

Tuten 11

invaluable to a study of the region’s movement history, and,

although it almost certainly did not include every event which

occurred during those two years, the report essentially served to

highlight which events local SNCC leadership found most pertinent

to relay to the national headquarters. These events included ones

which had occurred during the two years that SNCC had been

involved in the local community as well as intended projects and

goals for the longevity of the SW GA project. While the majority

of the events depicted involved situations in which young male

activists and leaders throughout SW GA faced police brutality and

imprisonment, there was greater female representation in this

specific paper than in many other SNCC newsletters, allowing the

audience a unique glimpse into the importance of female

involvement to the overall well-being of the movement in Albany.

Within the confines of the SNCC-compiled report, it is

imperative to analyze the tremendous brutality associated with

the female involvement as well as the very impact the involvement

of young women had on the formation of events. Whereas many of

the accounts of male participation discuss imprisonment, beatings

by police, and being turned away at the polls, all brutal and

Tuten 12

horrific incidents in their own right, the SNCC paper depicted

far more vicious realities for their female activists. From this

paper, the distinction between male and female has clearly been

made, and the plight of sexualization of the African American

woman was clearly identified.

It is also interesting to note that, very early into the

Albany movement, young women, especially Albany State College

(ASC) students, played a pivotal role in testing the waters.

According to the chronology presented within the report, less

than a month after the arrival of Sherrod and Reagon, on 22

November 1961, female activist and ASC student Bertha Gober,

along with a group of five fellow activists, was arrested for

entering the white waiting area at the Trailways Bus Station.

Although only imprisoned for a few days, her arrest and eventual

expulsion from ASC, which she was alerted to via a letter from

the Dean she received (while imprisoned) on November 25, sparked

a massive march against City Hall as well as a devastating

boycott of the Albany bus system.12 This march, led by fellow 12 “Southwest Georgia Project,” 5; Faith S. Holsaert. and Martha Prescod Norman Noonan,

Hands on the Freedom Plow: Personal Accounts by Women in SNCC (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2010)

Tuten 13

female students Bernice Johnson and 1961s Miss Albany State,

Annette Jones, was also discussed in further detail in Faith S.

Holsaert’s 2010 anthology, Hands on the Freedom Plow: Personal Accounts by

Women in SNCC. Unfortunately, contrary to SNCC’s early

assumptions, the administration of ASC was not willing to or

capable of allowing student involvement in the ‘evasive’

activities which the organization was supporting. This lack of

cooperation from the college resulted in the suspension and

permanent expulsion of nearly fifty student activists, including

Jones, who also lost her title as well as the scholarship that

accompanied it which would have allowed her to continue her

education at a more prestigious all-black university.13

The newsletter continued its chronology, sometimes with

great detail, as in the miscarriage of Mrs. King, and often with

a hauntingly short description which was comprised of, simply, a

name, age, and event. For example, an entry for 16 August 1962

simply read, “Shirley Gaines (16) of Albany beaten.”14 Other such

examples of the dangers of female youth involvement are depicted

in a similar manner. On July 7 and 8 respectively, the report 13 Holsaert, Hands on the Freedom Plow.14 “Southwest Georgia Project,” 8.

Tuten 14

noted simply that one “girl was slapped by the police” and “one

girl was dragged [down Freedom Alley] by one leg, her head

banging on the jail house steps.”15 While these events were

seemingly underreported by SNCC, the incidents often relegated to

a simple sentence, one cannot deny the power and strength from

such concise sentences and proceedings.

In a similar manner, Dennis Roberts, a Berkeley Law Student

who served as a legal assistant for civil rights attorney C.B.

King in the summer of 1963, kept a journal of his brief tenure in

SW GA. As a white (Northern) man who sympathized with the plight

of the African Americans, Roberts, like fellow SNCC activist

Perdew, found himself a target for the hostile local white

community. However, even in the face of adversity and threats,

Roberts continued his activism as well as the journaling process.

What emerged from his experiences was a unique glimpse into the

local legal activities of the movement. While the larger context

of his work refers to specific cases he assisted King in

defending as well as the personalities of the movement leaders he

became familiar with, Roberts also offered the reader a personal

15 “Southwest Georgia Project,” 11.

Tuten 15

glimpse behind the military state which emerged in SW GA as a

result of movement activity. Of particular importance to a study

of female involvement in the Albany movement was his description

of the imprisonment of youth activists. Throughout his

descriptions, Roberts illustrated the difficulties of prison

life, especially for the female population. The best example of

this emerged on Saturday, 22 June 1963. This date was the first

of his journal entries. On this date, Roberts vividly described

the conditions a group of local black girls were subject to

during their imprisonment. According to Roberts, the “cells

[were] unbelievably filthy, smells of human excretion overwhelm

you on entering. Puddles of water covered the floor and the Negro

girls complained of having water sprayed on them by the

police.”16 With this description, Roberts shared his experience

of being both overwhelmed by the brutality of the police, as well

as feeling empowered and uplifted by the strength of these young

women as well as their actions.

Throughout his journal, Roberts also alluded to the poor

health and safety conditions present within the prisons,

16 Dennis Roberts, Journal, 1963, 1.

Tuten 16

especially when the girls were sent out of Albany, to neighboring

rural SW GA counties such as Lee, Terrell, Baker, and Mitchell.

Although he often mentioned the threat of sexual violence towards

the young women, one of the most striking experiences Roberts

discussed was his trip to nearby Mitchell County where a group of

young girls, including fifteen-year-old JoAnne Christian, were

being held. In a commendable display of fortitude and gall,

Christian, as relayed by Roberts, “recounted in exact detail

every aspect of her arrest. Right in front of the jailer who is

an enormous and vicious brute, she told us how [he] mistreated

her, and when he screamed out that she was a ‘damned liar’ she

never flinched but kept on giving us the facts in the same

composed tone.”17 For Roberts, meeting this young woman, who had

been “beaten, kicked, and dropped through the arrest and while in

jail,” was a definitive moment in his SW GA experiences.18 He

continued to elaborate on Christian’s strength in her frightening

and dangerous position by highlighting that, because she had been

on a hunger strike for four days, a police officer had threatened

to kill her and Pritchett personally dragged her around the 17 Roberts, Journal, 1.18 Ibid., 1.

Tuten 17

jailhouse by her hair.19 Roberts continued his discussion of the

plight of the female youth activists by continuing to note the

unsanitary and dangerous conditions these juveniles were subject

to. In many circumstances, the young women were denied access to

feminine hygiene products, such as sanitary napkins, and, like

Christian, many were physically handled by hair pulling.20

Although the SNCC-produced reports and newsletters tended to

refer to the experiences of their female participants in greater

quantity than did the local and national media, as noted, their

experiences were often relegated to short sentences which seemed

to connote relatively unimportant or uninspiring actions when

compared to those of the male leaders. This analysis was not

meant to lessen the role or impact of the male activists or

leadership within the organization. However, it does suggest that

women, although they viewed themselves (and some male activists

agreed) as the backbone of the Albany movement, were often

relegated to the role of supporter, their gender specific plights

often ignored or lessened by the patriarchal society and male-

centric environment often presented by SNCC. This trend can also 19 Ibid., 1.20 Ibid.

Tuten 18

be noticed in the published secondary material concerning the

Albany movement. Two notorious examples, written by male

activists who participated in the SW GA project, followed this

pattern.

In Education of a Harvard Guy: Footsoldier in the Civil Rights Movement,

Perdew spoke very little of the role of women within the Albany

movement. Published in 2010, Perdew’s work illustrated his

initial entrance into the SW GA Civil Rights Movement. A white

Denverite, Perdew joined SNCC in hopes of chinking at the armor

of Jim Crow. Although initially drawn to the danger of the

movement, more specifically the possibility of arrest, Perdew

quickly became transfixed with the possibility of augmenting the

system of economic and social slavery that existed in the

American South under the system. Although Perdew was openly

active in both the Albany and Americus movements, he spoke very

little of the role of women within SNCC (or the local community

for that matter) within Albany other than as supporters, faces in

crowds, or givers of hospitality. Possibly the best example of

this was Mrs. Cora Jinks of East Albany, who offered her home as

an asylum for SNCC members, including Perdew. A supporter of the

Tuten 19

movement, Jinks offered SNCC members a place to sleep as well as

food, despite her limited income.21 Throughout his discussion of

Albany, Perdew seldom mentioned women as active members of the

movement. It was not until his discussion of Americus that he

began distinguishing female actors in the movement, such as

Gloria Wise, and established them as key figures in the successes

of the SW GA project. Instead, Perdew’s autobiography offered an

intimate glimpse into the inner cogs of the local SNCC

organization, Koinonia, and the local community.

In the second work, The Great Pool Jump & Other Stories from the Civil

Rights Movement in Southwest Georgia, published in 2010, authors and

movement veterans Randy Battle, Dennis Roberts, Curtis L.

Williams, and Pete De Lissovoy, included very little about direct

female activism. This was interesting in that the work served

essentially as an anthology composed of essays which sought to

detail their memories of their involvement in the movement in

Albany. Ironically, as noted above, they mentioned women on only

two occasions. The first discussion of women involved a

21 John Perdew, Education of a Harvard Guy: Footsoldier in the Civil Rights Movement

(Arkansas: GrantHouse Publishers, 2010), 31.

Tuten 20

previously mentioned excerpt from Roberts’s journal entry in

which he first met JoAnne Christian. The second entry involved

an incident in which a female movement leader’s home and beauty

salon were subject to attack by local whites. This incident will

be discussed in greater detail in the section regarding the

movement in rural SW GA.22

As noted previously, regardless of the limited role women

played in the memories of Albany male activists or the prominence

(or lack of) they held in the media coverage during the time,

women were the leaning posts for the local SW GA movement,

playing an important, dangerous, and diverse role. In Albany,

this position was undertaken in large capacities by the female

students of both local high schools, and, in increasing numbers,

Albany State. Possibly the best source for an analysis of the

role of these women came from Holsaert’s anthology, Hands on the

Freedom Plow.

Within the confines of her work, Holsaert and her fellow

editors have compiled a plethora of primary accounts of young 22 Randy Battle and Dennis Roberts, The Great Pool Jump & Other Stories from the Civil Rights

Movement in Southwest Georgia (New Hampshire: You Are Perfect Press, 2010).

Tuten 21

female students and the role they played within the movement.

From these accounts, the reader was better capable of

understanding not only the physical trauma these women were

subject to at the hands of their white prosecutors, but also the

commitment and passion they possessed for the success of the

movement and the search for freedom. These women often found

themselves at odds with the patriarchal society of SW GA, and,

because of these experiences, Hands on the Freedom Plow was able to

provide its audience with a unique glimpse into the world of the

female under SW GA’s Jim Crow system.

The female participants of Albany State risked much more

than police brutality and imprisonment. For many of the students,

such as Jones and Gober, their involvement in SNCC led to their

eventual expulsion from ASC. What was even more interesting,

however, was that, between the narratives describing jail-ins,

sit-ins, and police brutality, the women whose stories were

confined to this anthology successfully painted a detailed

picture about what it meant to be a woman in SW GA during the

1960s. For Jones, the realization of her gender as a point of

contention came when she would walk to her junior high school. As

Tuten 22

busses filled with neighboring poor white students passed by,

Jones would be berated with derogatory comments from both little

girls and little boys. While the little girls more readily called

her race into question, often referring to her as ‘nigger,’ the

little white boys would always ask her if she “[wanna] wallow for

a dollar?”23 She also faced a similar situation in which a “white

man tried to force [her] off the Flint River Bridge to the

embankment below, where, using sexually explicit language, he

made it clear he intended to ‘have a good time’” with her.24

Jones continued her assessment of the sexual oppression of black

women by noting that, although she was a college student, she was

not safe from harassment off or on campus, a sentiment that was

inarguably shared by her colleague, Bernice Johnson Reagon.

A freshman dorm councilor at ASC, Johnson intercepted a call

in which a white male (calling the freshman dorms) asked if she

would like to make twenty dollars. Confused and thinking she must

have been contacted by a radio game show, Johnson admitted that,

yes, she would like to make twenty dollars. After some time, it

became evident to her that this man was soliciting sex from poor 23 Holsaert, Hands on the Freedom Plow, 102.24 Holsaert, Hands on the Freedom Plow, 103.

Tuten 23

black women, and she therefore sought to bring the man to

justice. She agreed to meet him off campus, and immediately

alerted campus security, who then also alerted Albany police.

When the date in question arrived, she, initially unaided by any

security, held the man at bay. Although the ASC security

eventually did arrive, potentially saving her from rape or worse,

the police remained unhelpful and even failed to make an arrest

when they were presented with the license plate number for the

suspect. For Johnson, this was a defining moment in which she

realized her own oppression as well as the need for a focus on

the rights of women within the movement.25

For the female activists involved in the Albany movement,

“there was this tiny but growing awareness that being female was

different[, a sentiment which meant that, if] you were a girl,

some really bad things could happen to you—and often there was

not one thing you could do about it.”26 However, in the face of

sexual oppression, threat of imprisonment (in Albany or abroad),

police brutality, and even rape, women, in increasing numbers,

continued to play a vital and active role in the movement. 25 Ibid.26 Ibid., 126.

Tuten 24

Although their experiences were often relegated to simple

phrases, a name amongst a list of others, or that of supporter,

through the experiences of these women, dictated by themselves or

compiled by fellow SNCC activists, one can ascertain with

certainty that these young women were in fact pivotal to the

successes of the movement as well as active members in the battle

for freedom.

When discussing the SW GA project, the role of women within

the rural counties of Lee and Terrell are often dismissed. This

was true even during the movement years. During this time,

protestors in middle Georgia “joked ruefully that the civil

rights movement finished at Perry, a small town one hundred miles

south of Atlanta.”27 Often referred to as ‘Lamentable Lee’ and

‘Terrible Terrell,’ these rural SW GA counties have often been

understood simply as spill-over areas, counties where activists

were imprisoned when Albany or Americus’s jails reached capacity.

However, to relegate these rural counties to such an inferior

position is both unfair and false. While a movement the size of

those which emerged in Albany and Americus was not possible in

27 Tuck, Beyond Atlanta, 158.

Tuten 25

these areas due to the economic oppression of the majority black

population by the minority white population, a movement, while

small, did emerge, and grow, especially after SNCC’s involvement

in the area in 1962. Unfortunately, the movement did not have the

support or resources to flourish, and thus it disintegrated at

approximately the founding of the movement in Americus.

Both Lee and Terrell Counties were incredibly rural,

agriculturally based, and overwhelmingly African American. When

SNCC first entered the area, as was their goal in Albany, they

sought to create voter registration programs. In the rural

counties, this was a far more lucrative goal because, “[under]

Georgia’s county-unit system, the rural counties dominated the

state politically in the 1950s. The overturning of [this system]

in 1962 dramatically shifted the balance of power toward

metropolitan [and predominately white] counties.”28 In Terrell

County, the goal of voter registration was even more imperative.

In 1960, Federal Judge William Bootle issued an injunction

against the county because the registrars were preventing African

Americans from registering to vote. Because of the continued

28 Tuck, Beyond Atlanta, 159.

Tuten 26

insistence on white supremacy within the region, by 1961, there

were only fifty-three registered black voters in the majority

black county.29 As a result of the continued hostility and fear

present within the rural SW GA region, it was no surprise that,

upon hearing that SNCC and the ‘Freedom Riders’ were entering the

region, local high school students in both Lee and Terrell

Counties initiated a boycott of the high schools. After some

coaxing, some of the students in Lee County were able to convince

their parents, some of whom were involved in the local PTA, to

allow them to remain out of the Training School until their

demands were met, in this case the re-admittance of a suspended

male student, Charles Wingfield, after he had asked the principal

for better equipment.30This was an important concept, because, as

noted previously, rural counties were economically reliant on the

white population. Because of this economic oppression, these

counties failed to gain extended periods of support from the

local adult community. For this reason, local youth as well as

older and more economically independent women were responsible

for leading the movement.29 Ibid., 163.30 Ibid., 164; “Southwest Georgia Project,” 6.

Tuten 27

Although SNCC newsletters cited the leadership in Lee County

as Willie Ricks and George Best, and the leadership in Terrell

County as Bob Cover, the movements in Lee and Terrell Counties,

contrary to those in Albany and Americus, were predominately led

by groups of young women, as in the case of Lee County, as well

as two older women, Dolly Raines (Lee County) and Carolyn Daniels

(Terrell County). Although Raines was considered a movement

‘mama,’31 SNCC, in their “Southwest Georgia Project” report,

noted that the real support for the movement in Lee County came

from a group of ten to twelve high school students, most of which

were girls.32 While Raines was less renowned than her peer,

possibly due to her lack of desire to allow white members onto

her farm, an obvious dilemma due to SNCC’s interracial nature,

Daniels was a frequent topic of discussion within SNCC

newsletters as well as within some secondary works such as The

Great Pool Jump, and, most notably Stephen G. N. Tuck’s work Beyond

Atlanta: The Struggle for Racial Equality in Georgia, 1940-1980.

Published in 2001, Tuck’s work provided the reader with a

unique glimpse into other regions of protest within GA that have 31 Tuck, Beyond Atlanta, 169.32 “Southwest Georgia Project,” 23.

Tuten 28

often been overlooked. Although he still provided the reader with

an overview of the urban protests which ensued in Albany,

Atlanta, and Savannah, Tuck filled in the gap for rural protest

in the SW GA Project. It is interesting to note that, throughout

his discussion of the rural counties’ involvement in the

movement, Tuck, as well as his SNCC predecessors, tended to focus

their attentions on the involvement of older women, most notably

Daniels. While Tuck mentioned the involvement of Lee County youth

and parents in boycotting the local black high school, he often

discussed such actions in passing, instead choosing to focus on

the fortitude and strength of Daniels in the face of adversity.33

According to Tuck, Daniels, who owned her own beauty parlor,

fell victim to bombings of her home in late 1963. As noted by the

SNCC newsletter, “Southwest Georgia Project,” the “house of Mrs.

Carolyn Daniels which [had] served as a voter registration

headquarters in Terrell County for SNCC was riddled by bullets

and bombed early Sunday morning, [8 December 1963].”34 Daniels, a

committed movement activist, was not only physically wounded by

this event having been struck in the left foot, but she was 33 Tuck, Beyond Atlanta, 164.34 “Southwest Georgia Project,” 14.

Tuten 29

devastated by the loss of her home-based beauty parlor. According

to her, as well as fellow beauty parlor owner, Prathia Hall, many

local women would come to her salon in order to discuss movement

events and activities.35 One must not underestimate the

importance of such conversations as well as the empowerment

Daniels would have felt in her economic independence as well as

in her status as leader of the Terrell County movement at a time

when men tended to carry that mantle. Daniels had also previously

been arrested for speeding. Her license was then revoked for

ninety days. It was later discovered that she had been targeted

because she was driving poor African Americans to register to

vote.36

As noted previously, the counties of rural SW GA remained

economically dependent on the white community. Because of this,

as well as the engrained white supremacy which continued to limit

the success of activism within the region, SNCC soon abandoned

the rural project and instead turned their attention to Americus,

a city located just north of Lee County. It is interesting to

note, however, that Tuck, while he recognized the economic and 35 Tuck, Beyond Atlanta, 172.36 Roberts, Journal, 14.

Tuten 30

social limitations within the area, cited another source for the

failure of SNCC within the region. According to Tuck, the

“project did not initially canvass local women as a distinct

group. … The relative success of Daniels’s own citizenship

classes, with forty-five newly registered voters by the end of

1963, exposed SNCC’s mistake of initially using local women only

for support and hospitality rather than as canvassing

activists.”37

Although a much larger and more successful movement than its

predecessor in rural SW GA, the Americus Civil Rights Movement

has often suffered the same fate. In February 1963, SNCC leaders

Ralph Allen, Don Harris, and Perdew entered the city, again in

hopes of establishing voter registration campaigns as well as

community organizing. At the time of their arrival, of the nearly

15,000 inhabitants, fifty percent of whom were African American,

only thirty blacks were registered to vote.38 Fairly quickly, the

town, like its predecessor, also became ground zero for

revolution against the system of Jim Crow.

37 Tuck, Beyond Atlanta, 172.38 Perdew, Education of a Harvard Guy, 129.

Tuten 31

Unlike the Albany movement, which was overwhelmingly led by

female students enrolled in ASC, or the rural SW GA movement,

which was increasingly organized by older and more economically

independent women, the Americus movement was prodigiously led by

young women, particularly of high school and early college years.

This dichotomy was not lost on movement leader Perdew. Having

been actively involved in both the Albany and Americus movements,

Perdew’s autobiography, although mostly depicting his involvement

in Americus, presumably because he was most active in that region

and became notorious for his status as one of the Americus Four,

served as a wonderful lens through which to view the differences

and similarities of the two movements. From an early point in his

writing, Perdew admitted that he “was struck by how many of the

people in mass meetings in Americus were teenagers and children,

joined by a few adults.”39 According to Perdew, this stark

contrast was a result of economic oppression. Like neighboring

Lee and Terrell Counties, adults in Americus worked as domestics

or agricultural laborers and were thus in great danger of losing

their positions. For Perdew, this created a unique situation in

39 Ibid., 54.

Tuten 32

which young people, especially young women, were able to pick up

the mantle of responsibility.40

As noted previously, unlike sources detailing the Albany

movement, Americus female youth activism was far more represented

in the media, though less represented within SNCC newsletters and

correspondences. However, although Americus women’s activism was

more likely to be represented within the media (due in part to

the limited role large movement leaders such as King, Jr. played

in the area), their actions continued to be under-represented

when compared to those of their male counterparts. Possibly the

best example of this was the national and local media attention a

group of four men, popularly referred to as the Americus Four,

received in comparison to a larger group of young women, referred

to as the Stolen Girls, who were held in the nearby Leesburg

Stockade. Throughout many national and local newspapers, every

detail of the arrest, imprisonment, and trial of the Americus

Four was broadcast. Perdew, in his autobiography, exacerbated

this point by including an entire chapter dedicated to newspaper

clippings detailing his experiences as one of the four. For the

40 Perdew, Education of a Harvard Guy, 54.

Tuten 33

young women of the Leesburg Stockade, however, who will be

discussed in greater detail below, their media representation was

slimmer, their renown becoming more recognized decades after

their imprisonment.

Whereas women’s involvement in the Americus movement was

more likely to be reported through the media, their activism was

under-reported in the SNCC newsletters. As noted previously, the

Albany movement was very well represented within SNCC documents,

including the involvement of women. For Americus, however,

although led by young women, this was not the case. It is

important to note, however, that in SNCC’s aforementioned

“Southwest Georgia Project” report, one of the first situations

in which Americus was mentioned involved the rape of a local

African American activist, Annie B. Hayes. According to the

account, Hayes was returning from the store when she was picked

up by a white man and held hostage for the entire day. She was

eventually returned to her mother that night with severe trauma.

Although her brother and mother both witnessed her kidnapping,

the local police, led by Sheriff Fred Chappell, refused to

investigate. On June 11, four days later, Hayes died from her

Tuten 34

injuries.41 As noted in the case of the Albany movement, women

activists were sexualized and they became targets for even

greater acts of cruelty and brutality. One may also note that,

within the context of the “Southwest Georgia Project” report,

Hayes’s death was the first of its kind as well as one of the

only examples in which women’s involvement as movement activists

within Americus was mentioned.

Within the local black community, the large-scale

involvement of youth in Americus was unique. Perdew, who was in

his early twenties at the time of his involvement in the Americus

movement, noted, on more than one occasion, that “the high school

kids were the strength of the Movement; they were the ones who

would go to jail, canvass the neighborhoods, and hang out at the

SNCC house.”42 Perdew furthered his distinction of the

distinctive nature of the Americus movement by noting that the

“Albany Movement, in contrast, was dominated by adults, with

officers and official meetings.”43 This youth-oriented experience

was potentially best realized with the 1963 publication of “The

41 “Southwest Georgia Project,” 11.42 Perdew, Education of a Harvard Guy, 146.43 Ibid., 146.

Tuten 35

Voice of Americus,” a newspaper that was created by local

students Sammy Mahone and Collins Maghee.44 The newspaper,

staffed and maintained by resident youth, was distributed tri-

weekly and detailed events pertinent to the movement as well as

the community. Though rarely, if at all, mentioned in the SNCC

newsletters, “The Voice of Americus” was a successful means by

which young people of the movement were, for five cents, able to

further spread their ideas as well as those of civil rights.

Although the newspaper detailed a number of topics ranging

from literary reviews to arrest reports, it is imperative to note

the importance young women played in the staffing of the

newspaper, as well as in the events which were reported. For

example, in Volume One, Number One of the newspaper, published 3

May 1964, three of the five articles listed on the front page

were either written by women, such as “Manhattan Shirt Factory”

written by Jewel Wise and Helen Williams, and “The Opening of the

Foodland Supermarket” written by Amanda Bowens (who later married

Perdew), or detailed events in which women played a prominent

role.45 In later editions of the newspaper, such events as the 44 Tuck, Beyond Atlanta, 178.45 “The Voice of Americus,” Vol. 1, No. 1, May 3, 1964.

Tuten 36

Maids Union, sexual assault of women, and the integration of

Americus High School were discussed in greater detail.

Because the “Voice of Americus” sought to enlighten its

audience through its reports detailing various diverse events in

the local movement, it was unable to provide events in great

detail. Ironically, one of the best sources describing the

involvement of women in the Americus movement comes from SNCC

leader Perdew. Throughout the course of his autobiography, Perdew

paid strict attention to the diverse, and at times militant, role

young women played in the Americus movement. Still relatively

novice to the system of police brutality that was rampant

throughout SW GA, one of the first events that struck Perdew

occurred when a group of activists were dispersing from

Friendship Baptist Church on 8 August 1963. As the crowd was

beginning to leave the church, they were met with roughly twenty

police officers (known ironically in Americus as Blue Angels)

equipped with cattle prods and billyclubs. Without waiting for

the group to disperse, the police began ruthlessly attacking the

crowd. During the event, fourteen-year-old Sallie Mae Durham, who

had been striking the back of a police officer as he was

Tuten 37

mercilessly beating movement leader Don Harris, was arrested on

charges of assault with intent to murder, a sentence which

resulted in her spending a prolonged period of time in jail.46

Perdew continued his discussion of the role of women within

the movement by describing how many of the female activists, most

notably Minnie and Jewel Wise, when he and his fellow Americus

Four were incarcerated, would smuggle mail into and out of the

jail for them. According to Perdew, the women would “bundle the

mail in a package, which they would leave in a trash barrel on

the grounds of the jail, where a trustee (prisoner), whose job

was trash collection, picked it up and delivered it to us through

the bars.”47 This was an important function which helped the men

keep up their morale as well as remain in touch with SNCC, their

family, and the broader community.

Although Perdew noted that the Americus women could be

counted on to provide support to their fellow activists, he also

realized the extreme violence women were often subject to. To

further this discussion, Perdew noted two specific events which

involved his future wife, Amanda Bowens. The first event occurred46 Perdew, Education of a Harvard Guy, 56-58.47 Ibid.

Tuten 38

as she was picketing against white-owned businesses in downtown

Americus. These businesses, which catered to a mostly black

clientele, often refused to hire African American employees. As

she was picketing against this economic tyranny, Bowens was

physically assaulted by a white man. After taking her sign from

her, he resorted to tearing it up in front of her. After she

bravely referred to him as a coward and a poor example for his

daughter, who he had with him at the time, he slapped her across

the face with the stick of her sign.48 Bowens was again accosted

during her involvement while she was waiting in line to register

to vote with fellow activists Gloria Wise (who would later

integrate Georgia Southwestern in 1965) and Bennie Jean Daniels.

After waiting in line for hours, the three women sought a clean

restroom. Because the restroom for African American women was not

clean, they decided to utilize the facilities designated for

white women. Upon hearing of their entrance into the ‘white

restroom,’ Sheriff Chappell “brazenly barged into the restroom

and dragged them out by their hair.”49 This would have been a

humiliating and violent event, one which would have possibly been48 Perdew, Education of a Harvard Guy, 70.49 Ibid., 134.

Tuten 39

a common experience for female activists young and old alike. A

similar humiliation occurred with the integration of the local

white high school, Americus High School. Although Perdew only

mentioned the students involved in the project in passing, Minnie

Jewel Wise, David Bell, Robertina Freeman, and Dobbs Wiggins were

subject to rampant hostility, violence from the local students

and teachers, and, as a result, a very unequal education. Some of

the students, such as Wise, felt so taken aback by the hostility

that she did not complete her education at Americus High School,

instead choosing to return to Atlanta with her sister, Gloria

Wise, upon her return to Spellman College.

Unfortunately, although Perdew offered an interesting

glimpse into a changing white masculinity, the Americus

community, and local youth involvement, where his analysis falls

short was his very vague discussion of one of the most locally

renowned cases: that of the Stolen Girls. In the summer of 1963,

nearly forty young girls, ranging in age from eleven to

seventeen, were arrested during a protest march. One of the

girls, Lulu Westbrooks Griffin, thirteen at the time, was

severely injured during her imprisonment, a result of being first

Tuten 40

blasted by a water hose and then beaten by a male police officer.

Throughout their imprisonment, which lasted for forty-five days,

the young women were subject to cruelty, exposure to the elements

and wild animals (namely a rattlesnake thrown into the cell by

their captors), as well as hunger, lack of medical attention and

personal hygiene products, and poor sanitation. The experiences

of these young women, although often forgotten or barely

mentioned in secondary sources, were incredibly traumatic,

resulting in some of the parents sending their children to

boarding schools in urban areas. Their experiences have been

preserved by Danny Lyon, the SNCC photographer who catalogued the

girls and their harsh living conditions in his work Memories of the

Southern Civil Rights Movement, Griffin, who personally published her

experiences in a short autobiography entitled Freedom is Not Free: 45

Days in Leesburg Stockade, in the testimonies of some of the girls,

most notably that of thirteen-year-old Henrietta Fuller, as well

as in a 2006 article published in Essence magazine. As noted

previously, the case of the Stolen Girls was met with limited

media attention. In the circumstances when their arrest was

published, their stories were often utilized as a means by which

Tuten 41

to encourage activism and promote sympathy for the dangers

present through direct activism, particularly for youth and

women. For Perdew, one could potentially argue that he, and SNCC,

paid limited attention to the case not because they failed to

find the situation to be tragic and unfortunate, but because the

notoriety of the event was based on the victimization of the

young women, not their activism and courage.

While their contributions were equally significant, one must

not underestimate the seeming radical nature of female protest

coupled with the hostile environment of the South, best

represented with the rampant sexual oppression black women were

faced with at the hands of their white male counterparts. As

noted by scholar Danielle L. McGuire in her essay “‘It Was Like

All of Us Had Been Raped’: Sexual Violence, Community

Mobilization, and the African American Freedom Struggle,” black

women were particularly vulnerable under the system of Jim Crow.

Subject to the same police brutality, extended imprisonment, and

economic disparity as their male counterparts, African American

women also faced the very real threat of rape or another form of

sexually-inspired violence. According to McGuire,

Tuten 42

[rape], like lynching and murder, served as a tool of psychological and physical intimidation that expressed whitemale domination and buttressed white supremacy. During the Jim Crow era, women’s bodies served as signposts of the social order, and white men used rape and rumors of rape notonly to justify violence against black men but to remind black women that their bodies were not their own.50

Regardless of this very real form of psychological and bodily

specific warfare, black women in the hostile environment of SW GA

felt compelled to action in the fight for civil rights. One may

question why these individuals were willing to risk their lives,

well-being, health, and dignity for the cause of freedom,

especially when their actions, at the time and in many people’s

lasting memory, were often relegated to an inferior, submissive,

supporting role. According to Holsaert, this answer can be found

in the women’s search to attain “dignity, equality, and an end to

sexual oppression, brutality, and terrorism.”51 With these goals

in mind, local women became the “‘leaning posts’” of the

50 Danielle L. McGuire, “’It Was Like All of Us Had Been Raped’: Sexal Violence, Community

Mobilization, and the African American Freedom Struggle” in Other Souths: Diversity &

Difference in the U.S. South, Reconstruction to Present, Pg. 298-327 (Georgia: The University of Georgia Press, 2008), 299.

51 Holsaert, Hands on the Freedom Plow, 87.

Tuten 43

movement, very actively involved in movement events and the

spread of SNCC as well as integrationist ideals.52

Bibliography

Primary Sources

Battle, Randy and Dennis Roberts. The Great Pool Jump & Other Stories fromthe Civil Rights

Movement in Southwest Georgia. New Hampshire: You Are Perfect Press, 2010.

Lewis, John. Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement. New York: Simon & Schuster,

1998.

Lyon, Danny. Memories of the Southern Civil Rights Movement. North Carolina: The University

of North Carolina Press, 1992.

Perdew, John. Education of a Harvard Guy: Footsoldier in the Civil Rights Movement.

Arkansas: GrantHouse Publishers, 2010.

Roberts, Dennis. Journal, 1963.

“SNCC Newsletter” 1962.

52 Ibid., 87.

Tuten 44

“Southwest Georgia Project.” Submitted to the Coordinating Committee of SNCC on 27 Dec.

1963.

Westbrooks-Griffin, Lulu. Freedom is Not Free: 45 Days in Leesburg Stockade.

Secondary Sources

Holsaert, Faith S. and Martha Prescod Norman Noonan. Hands on the Freedom Plow: Personal

Accounts by Women in SNCC. Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2010.

McGuire, Danielle L. “’It Was Like All of Us Had Been Raped’: Sexal Violence, Community

Mobilization, and the African American Freedom Struggle” in Other Souths: Diversity & Difference in the U.S. South, Reconstruction to Present,pp. 298-327. Georgia: The University of Georgia Press, 2008.

Reporting Civil Rights Part One: American Journalism 1941-1963. New York: The Library of

America, 2003.

“Stolen Girls” in Essence Magazine. Pg. 162.

“Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Sit-In Movement, 1960” in Let Nobody

Turn Us Around: An African American Anthology. Pg. 371-372. Maryland:Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2009.

“The Voice of Americus” Volume One, Two, and Three.

Tuck, Stephen G. N. Beyond Atlanta: The Struglle for Racial Equality in Georgia, 1940-1980.

Georgia: The University of Georgia Press, 2001.

Zinn, Howard. SNCC: The New Abolitionists. Massachusetts: Beacon Press,1964.

Tuten 45