1961 Archives

Fred Ross

Profile. By Gabriel Thompson. 2013.
Introduction to little-known but influential labor organizer Fred Ross (1910-1992), who trained many activists of note including Dolores Huerta and Cesar Chavez.

Have You Heard From Johannesburg

Film. Directed by Connie Field. 2007. 89 minutes.
Episode that covers the anti-apartheid movement in the U.S. to overturn apartheid in South Africa.

Journey to Jo’burg: A South African Story

Book — Fiction. By Beverley Naidoo, illustrated by Eric Velasquez. 1988. 96 pages.
A brother and sister take their sick sibling to the city of Johannesburg to get their mother at work, and come to understand the struggle for freedom and dignity taking place in South Africa.

Freedom Day in Hattiesburg, Mississippi

Article. By Howard Zinn. From Chapter 6 of You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train.
Zinn describes the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) voting rights campaign called Freedom Day in Hattiesburg, Miss.

Freedom Summer 1964

Profile. Summer initiative to register African American voters in Mississippi.

Voices From the Plain of Jars: Life Under an Air War

Book — Non-fiction. Edited by Fred Branfman. 2013 (original edition, 1972). 196 pages.
Essays, drawings, and poems by Laotian villagers who survived almost 10 years of widespread, persistent, and devastating bombing during the Vietnam War in a covert operation in Laos.

Memories of Huey P. Newton and the Black Panthers

"Thank you for posting the picture of Huey Newton and the children. I am the girl in the picture. I was 11-years-old and volunteering as a typist for the Black Panther Party . . . Today I work on computers, so I am still typing!" -- Annissa Nadirah Karim

Maestra (Teacher)

Film. By Catherine Murphy. 2013. 32 minutes.
Documentary about the successful 1961 literacy campaign in Cuba.

The Untold History of the United States DVD

Film. By Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick. 2014. 4 discs – 796 minutes.
TV series that re-examines various under-reported events of U.S. history since World War II.

This Little Light of Mine: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer

Book — Non-fiction. By Kay Mills. 2007. 390 pages.
First-hand accounts of Fannie Lou Hamer's emergence as a leader of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s.

Risking Everything: A Freedom Summer Reader

Book — Non-fiction. Edited by Michael Edmonds. 2014. 250 pages.
Anthology of first hand accounts and primary documents from the 1964 Mississippi Freedom Summer Project.

Moses, Robert “Bob” Parris

Profile. Robert "Parris" Moses (born Jan. 23, 1935) is a voting rights organizer, educator, and founder of the Algebra Project.

Victoria Gray and MFDP delegates demonstrating | Zinn Education Project

Sharecroppers Challenge U.S. Apartheid: The Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party

Teaching Activity. By Julian Hipkins III, Deborah Menkart, Sara Evers, and Jenice View.
Role play on the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) that introduces students to a vital example of small “d” democracy in action. For grades 7+.

Teaching Activity by Deborah Menkart

Freedom Summer

Film. Written, produced, and directed by Stanley Nelson. 2014. 120 minutes.
Documentary about 1964 Freedom Summer in Mississippi.

This Nonviolent Stuff’ll Get You Killed: How Guns Made the Civil Rights Movement Possible

Book — Non-fiction. By Charles E. Cobb Jr. 2015. 328 pages.
Cobb Jr. describes the vital role that armed self-defense played in the survival and liberation of black communities in America during the Southern Freedom Movement of the 1960s.

Teaching Activity by Charles Cobb