*Ø* Blogmanac August 28 | Three events in US civil rights history
The death of Emmett Till
1955 USA: While visiting family in Money, Mississippi, African-American teenager Emmett Till was brutally murdered after speaking "inappropriately" to a white woman.
The questionable trial that followed, and Mrs Till's decision to display her son's mutilated remains during an open-casket funeral, help to mobilize opposition to segregation in America.
Probably the most important troubadour of the movement in the early 1960s was Bob Dylan, who had performed on sites where "black is the color and none is the number”. Born in the same year as his fellow Midwesterner Till, Dylan was to transcribe his sense of horror in the Delta in an early song, The Death of Emmett Till.
Excerpt:
Some men they dragged him to a barn
and there they beat him up.
They said they had a reason,
but I can't remember what.
They tortured him and did some things
too evil to repeat.
They were screaming sounds inside the barn,
there was laughing sounds out on the street.
Then they rolled his body down a gulf
amidst a bloody red rain
and they threw him in the waters wide
to cease his screaming pain.
The reason that they killed him there,
and I'm sure it ain't no lie,
Was just for the fun of killin' him
and watch him slowly die.
Source: The Daily Bleed
More
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I have a dream
1963 USA: 250,000-500,000 people converged on the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington, the largest single protest demonstration in US history, organized to support sweeping civil rights measures. A highlight is Martin Luther King Jr's now famous “I have a dream” speech, in which he declared:
"I have a dream that my four children will one day live
Joan Baez, Odetta, Josh White, SNCC Freedom Singers, Peter, Paul and Mary, and Bob Dylan performed.
Source: The Daily Bleed
Audio of the speech (requires Real media)
NY Times article
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In a land of free speech
1968 Yippie activist Abbie Hoffman was arrested while having breakfast at a restaurant for having the word ‘Fuck’ written on his forehead. He was charged with resisting arrest and disorderly conduct. He listed his occupation as ‘revolutionary artist’. Hoffman was to appear in court in answer to the complaints on September 6.
The death of Emmett Till
1955 USA: While visiting family in Money, Mississippi, African-American teenager Emmett Till was brutally murdered after speaking "inappropriately" to a white woman.
The questionable trial that followed, and Mrs Till's decision to display her son's mutilated remains during an open-casket funeral, help to mobilize opposition to segregation in America.
Probably the most important troubadour of the movement in the early 1960s was Bob Dylan, who had performed on sites where "black is the color and none is the number”. Born in the same year as his fellow Midwesterner Till, Dylan was to transcribe his sense of horror in the Delta in an early song, The Death of Emmett Till.
Excerpt:
Some men they dragged him to a barn
and there they beat him up.
They said they had a reason,
but I can't remember what.
They tortured him and did some things
too evil to repeat.
They were screaming sounds inside the barn,
there was laughing sounds out on the street.
Then they rolled his body down a gulf
amidst a bloody red rain
and they threw him in the waters wide
to cease his screaming pain.
The reason that they killed him there,
and I'm sure it ain't no lie,
Was just for the fun of killin' him
and watch him slowly die.
Source: The Daily Bleed
More
I have a dream
1963 USA: 250,000-500,000 people converged on the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington, the largest single protest demonstration in US history, organized to support sweeping civil rights measures. A highlight is Martin Luther King Jr's now famous “I have a dream” speech, in which he declared:
"I have a dream that my four children will one day live
in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin
but by the content of their character."
Joan Baez, Odetta, Josh White, SNCC Freedom Singers, Peter, Paul and Mary, and Bob Dylan performed.
Source: The Daily Bleed
Audio of the speech (requires Real media)
NY Times article
In a land of free speech
1968 Yippie activist Abbie Hoffman was arrested while having breakfast at a restaurant for having the word ‘Fuck’ written on his forehead. He was charged with resisting arrest and disorderly conduct. He listed his occupation as ‘revolutionary artist’. Hoffman was to appear in court in answer to the complaints on September 6.
Pip Wilson posted item above at 3:54 PM | Permalink
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