Fannie Lou Hamer's Statue Unveiling
Fannie Lou Hamer is remembered across the world as the woman who was “sick and tired of being sick and tired.” Many remember Hamer for her unstinting passion for civil and human rights, equality and justice. In 1962 when she decided to go register to vote she challenged her boss W. D. Marlowe by telling him, "I didn’t go register for you sir, I did it for myself,” when he ordered her to remove her name from the voters registration or she had to move. From then on she dedicated herself to registering Black voters and other social causes, and suffered imprisonment, beatings and assassination attempts but she stayed strong and persevered. The racially diverse Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, that Hamer helped organize, challenged the seating of an all-White Mississippi delegation at the 1964 Democratic National Convention. President Lyndon Johnson called a press conference, after hearing her eloquent, fiery and defining speech, to try to negate attention away from her. It's said that, if you were to hear her voice, it was so deep and powerful, that it seems to shake the air as she talks. Hundreds of people gathered to see a life-sized bronze statue of civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer as it was unveiled at the Fannie Lou Hamer Memorial Gardens in Ruleville, Miss., Friday, Oct. 5, 2012.
|
|
