Marching on the City of Big Shoulders: Stories from the Chicago Freedom Movement

To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Chicago Freedom Movement, the IOP, Center for the Study of Race, Politics, and Culture (CSRPC), Office of Multicultural Student Affairs (OMSA), Black Metropolis Research Consortium, and Pozen Family Center for Human Rights, partnered to convene a panel of activists from the 60s, and mounting a photo exhibit of rare color photographs of Martin Luther King Jr.'s time on the South and West Sides of Chicago, on Thursday, May 19, 2016.

Don Rose, Press Secretary for Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1966, Mary Lou Finley, Secretary to James Bevel in 1966 and Brenetta Howell Barrett, West Side political activist and NAACP regional director at the time, will share stories of what the city was like when Martin Luther King, Jr. moved with his family into a tenement in North Lawndale to aid the civil rights movement in Chicago. Recognizing that Voting Rights was just a first step in achieving full civil rights, King and his Southern supporters worked with local activists and drew volunteers from around the country to launch a campaign to end the slums called the Chicago Freedom Movement. Facing fierce opposition from city leaders and many white residents, King led open housing marches that were met with violence and hostility he deemed worse than anything he'd seen in the South. This special event examined the movement and its legacy 50 years later. Moderated by Susan Smith Richardson, editor and publisher of The Chicago Reporter.

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