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PITTSBURG —
The summer of 1964 marked a milestone in the battle for civil rights in the United States. It was a life-changing experience for many of the hundreds who participated, and brought death to four of them.
And it has been largely forgotten by the general public. Bruce Watson, author of “Freedom Summer,” wants to change that.
He will speak in a free public program at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in room 109, Grubbs Hall, Pittsburg State University.
“Civil rights is a huge topic in schools now, but what’s taught often begins with Rosa Parks and ends with Martin Luther King,” Watson said Wednesday in a telephone interview from his home in western Massachusetts. “I wanted to pay tribute to this turning point.”
More formally known as the Mississippi Summer Project, Freedom Summer was a campaign launched in June 1964 to register as many African American voters as possible in Mississippi, which at that time almost totally denied black persons the right to vote by charging them expensive poll taxes, forcing them to take especially difficult literacy tests and harassing would-be voters economically. Those who persisted in their efforts to exercise their right to vote often had their homes or farms burned, were beaten or lynched.
Volunteers were recruited on college campuses across the nation to go to Mississippi to work alongside the black Mississippians to help secure their rights. Over 1,000 out-of-state volunteers participated in Freedom Summer.
“John F. Kennedy had just been killed, and there was an exceptional amount of idealism then,” Watson said. “He had started the Peace Corps and young people were helping those in other countries, so others became aware of the need to overcome injustice here in the United States.”
He was able to speak with many, black and white, who took part in Freedom Summer.
“I had plenty of sources when I was researching the book,” the author said.
“Many of these volunteers were college students in their 20s, and still have vivid memories of Freedom Summer. Everybody was so young and that amazed me, considering what they had done.”
He added that he also had the honor of talking with Robert Parris Moses, who was field secretary of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and directed the summer project.
Though the project was completely nonviolent, it was struck by violence almost immediately. On June 21, 1964, James Chaney, a black activist from Mississippi, along with Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman, both from New York, were arrested, held in jail until nightfall, then released into a waiting ambush by Ku Klux Klan members who abducted and murdered them. Their disappearance, and the eventually discovery of their bodies, finally drew media attention to the situation in Mississippi.
The summer of 1964 marked a milestone in the battle for civil rights in the United States. It was a life-changing experience for many of the hundreds who participated, and brought death to four of them.
And it has been largely forgotten by the general public. Bruce Watson, author of “Freedom Summer,” wants to change that.
He will speak in a free public program at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in room 109, Grubbs Hall, Pittsburg State University.
“Civil rights is a huge topic in schools now, but what’s taught often begins with Rosa Parks and ends with Martin Luther King,” Watson said Wednesday in a telephone interview from his home in western Massachusetts. “I wanted to pay tribute to this turning point.”
More formally known as the Mississippi Summer Project, Freedom Summer was a campaign launched in June 1964 to register as many African American voters as possible in Mississippi, which at that time almost totally denied black persons the right to vote by charging them expensive poll taxes, forcing them to take especially difficult literacy tests and harassing would-be voters economically. Those who persisted in their efforts to exercise their right to vote often had their homes or farms burned, were beaten or lynched.
Volunteers were recruited on college campuses across the nation to go to Mississippi to work alongside the black Mississippians to help secure their rights. Over 1,000 out-of-state volunteers participated in Freedom Summer.
“John F. Kennedy had just been killed, and there was an exceptional amount of idealism then,” Watson said. “He had started the Peace Corps and young people were helping those in other countries, so others became aware of the need to overcome injustice here in the United States.”
He was able to speak with many, black and white, who took part in Freedom Summer.
“I had plenty of sources when I was researching the book,” the author said.
“Many of these volunteers were college students in their 20s, and still have vivid memories of Freedom Summer. Everybody was so young and that amazed me, considering what they had done.”
He added that he also had the honor of talking with Robert Parris Moses, who was field secretary of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and directed the summer project.
Though the project was completely nonviolent, it was struck by violence almost immediately. On June 21, 1964, James Chaney, a black activist from Mississippi, along with Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman, both from New York, were arrested, held in jail until nightfall, then released into a waiting ambush by Ku Klux Klan members who abducted and murdered them. Their disappearance, and the eventually discovery of their bodies, finally drew media attention to the situation in Mississippi.
Today, Mississippi has numerous African American elected officials and, of course, the nation elected its first black president.
Still, Watson believes the battle against racism isn’t over.
“I do see a lot of overtly racist comments about President Obama online,” he said.
“But you can’t beat people up in public any more and get away scot free.”
Last semester the PSU history 102 class was assigned to do a book report on “Freedom Summer,” and one of the students, Karen Gorentz, researched Watson online, found his e-mail address and contacted him. She was surprised to receive a prompt personal reply.
“I asked him if he would be willing to come to PSU to speak about his book, and I was shocked, to say the least, when he agreed to come, especially since I had not spoken to anyone from PSU yet,” Gorentz said. “ While crossing my fingers, I contacted the PSU Campus Activities Department and they agreed to look into it and see if they could put something together in order to make this happen. I was doing some serious praying that PSU would agree to host Bruce Watson, and they did, thank God.”
Watson is also the author of “Bread and Roses,” chosen by the New York Public Library as one of “25 Books to Remember in 2005,” and “Sacco and Vanzetti: The Men, the Murders and the Judgment of Mankind,” which was a Book of the Month selection and was nominated for an Edgar Award by the Mystery Writers of America.
He’s also written more than 40 feature articles for “Smithsonian Magazine,” and others for The Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post and “Newsweek.” One of his articles was included in “The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2003.”
“Right now I’m doing freelance articles and looking for my next book,” the author said.
Watson said he was pleased to accept the invitation to speak at Pittsburg.
“I try to close the gap on what people don’t know a little bit more with each talk,” the author said. “And I knew about Pittsburg before. I was a Los Angeles Dodgers fan, and I was introduced to Pittsburg by Bill Russell.”
