Sojourner Truth Radio

Today, we continue our 7-part series on the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee known as SNCC, focusing on the late civil rights activist, comedian, and social critic Dick Gregory.

During this episode, you will hear a speech at the SNCC 50th anniversary conference by Gregory, who died at 84 in August of 2017. Gregory used his comedic abilities to communicate the need for civil-rights activism as well as in his efforts of direct action, such as an attempt to integrate a Mississippi restaurant before the historic 1963 March on Washington.

At protest marches, Gregory was repeatedly beaten and jailed, once telling a police officer who dragged him across the street, Thanks a million. Up north, police dont escort me across the street. Gregory is remembered for his combination of wit and insight to combat racism in the United States.

Today, we continue our 7-part series on the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee known as SNCC, focusing on the late civil rights activist, comedian, and social critic Dick Gregory.

During this episode, you will hear a speech at the SNCC 50th anniversary conference by Gregory, who died at 84 in August of 2017. Gregory used his comedic abilities to communicate the need for civil-rights activism as well as in his efforts of direct action, such as an attempt to integrate a Mississippi restaurant before the historic 1963 March on Washington.

At protest marches, Gregory was repeatedly beaten and jailed, once telling a police officer who dragged him across the street, Thanks a million. Up north, police dont escort me across the street. Gregory is remembered for his combination of wit and insight to combat racism in the United States.

Today, we continue our 7-part series on the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee known as SNCC, focusing on the late civil rights activist, comedian, and social critic Dick Gregory.

During this episode, you will hear a speech at the SNCC 50th anniversary conference by Gregory, who died at 84 in August of 2017. Gregory used his comedic abilities to communicate the need for civil-rights activism as well as in his efforts of direct action, such as an attempt to integrate a Mississippi restaurant before the historic 1963 March on Washington.

At protest marches, Gregory was repeatedly beaten and jailed, once telling a police officer who dragged him across the street, Thanks a million. Up north, police dont escort me across the street. Gregory is remembered for his combination of wit and insight to combat racism in the United States.

Today on Sojourner Truth, we hear Part 1 of music from the The Freedom Singers performed live during the 50th anniversary conference of SNCC in Raleigh, North Carolina in 2010. Join us as we travel back in time and listen to the songs that mobilized millions of people across the country and around the world for peace and equality.

During the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 60s, music played an integral role in the inspiration and mobilization of Black and white people across the United States against racism and poverty. Groups like The Freedom Singers, which began as a student quartet in 1962 at Albany State College in Georgia, provided the soundtrack to the mass movement that was taking place in that era. Organizations like the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, known as SNCC, began using this music as a tool for progress.

The Freedom Singers were organized by Cordell Reagon in 1962. After witnessing the power of the singing in the Albany mass meetings, Pete Seeger suggested to James Forman that a singing group would be very supportive of the organization in building support, sharing information and raising funds. Cordell, one of the SNCC field secretaries who came to Albany, Georgia in 1961, was a tenor singer out of the Nashville sit-in movement. The youngest member of SNCCs staff, by 1961 he had been on the Freedom Rides, working in voter registration and participated in sit-in demonstrations. He formed the first group of Freedom Singers from the movements he had been active in across the country.

Overall, the power of congregational-style singing, fused with Black Baptist acappella church singing and protest songs and chants, became instrumental in empowering and educating listeners about civil rights issues. It was also a powerful social weapon of influence in the fight against Jim Crow segregation.

Today on Sojourner Truth, we hear Part 1 of music from the The Freedom Singers performed live during the 50th anniversary conference of SNCC in Raleigh, North Carolina in 2010. Join us as we travel back in time and listen to the songs that mobilized millions of people across the country and around the world for peace and equality.

During the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 60s, music played an integral role in the inspiration and mobilization of Black and white people across the United States against racism and poverty. Groups like The Freedom Singers, which began as a student quartet in 1962 at Albany State College in Georgia, provided the soundtrack to the mass movement that was taking place in that era. Organizations like the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, known as SNCC, began using this music as a tool for progress.

The Freedom Singers were organized by Cordell Reagon in 1962. After witnessing the power of the singing in the Albany mass meetings, Pete Seeger suggested to James Forman that a singing group would be very supportive of the organization in building support, sharing information and raising funds. Cordell, one of the SNCC field secretaries who came to Albany, Georgia in 1961, was a tenor singer out of the Nashville sit-in movement. The youngest member of SNCCs staff, by 1961 he had been on the Freedom Rides, working in voter registration and participated in sit-in demonstrations. He formed the first group of Freedom Singers from the movements he had been active in across the country.

Overall, the power of congregational-style singing, fused with Black Baptist acappella church singing and protest songs and chants, became instrumental in empowering and educating listeners about civil rights issues. It was also a powerful social weapon of influence in the fight against Jim Crow segregation.

Today on Sojourner Truth, we hear Part 1 of music from the The Freedom Singers performed live during the 50th anniversary conference of SNCC in Raleigh, North Carolina in 2010. Join us as we travel back in time and listen to the songs that mobilized millions of people across the country and around the world for peace and equality.

During the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 60s, music played an integral role in the inspiration and mobilization of Black and white people across the United States against racism and poverty. Groups like The Freedom Singers, which began as a student quartet in 1962 at Albany State College in Georgia, provided the soundtrack to the mass movement that was taking place in that era. Organizations like the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, known as SNCC, began using this music as a tool for progress.

The Freedom Singers were organized by Cordell Reagon in 1962. After witnessing the power of the singing in the Albany mass meetings, Pete Seeger suggested to James Forman that a singing group would be very supportive of the organization in building support, sharing information and raising funds. Cordell, one of the SNCC field secretaries who came to Albany, Georgia in 1961, was a tenor singer out of the Nashville sit-in movement. The youngest member of SNCCs staff, by 1961 he had been on the Freedom Rides, working in voter registration and participated in sit-in demonstrations. He formed the first group of Freedom Singers from the movements he had been active in across the country.

Overall, the power of congregational-style singing, fused with Black Baptist acappella church singing and protest songs and chants, became instrumental in empowering and educating listeners about civil rights issues. It was also a powerful social weapon of influence in the fight against Jim Crow segregation.

Today on Sojourner Truth, we hear Part 1 of music from the The Freedom Singers performed live during the 50th anniversary conference of SNCC in Raleigh, North Carolina in 2010. Join us as we travel back in time and listen to the songs that mobilized millions of people across the country and around the world for peace and equality.

During the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 60s, music played an integral role in the inspiration and mobilization of Black and white people across the United States against racism and poverty. Groups like The Freedom Singers, which began as a student quartet in 1962 at Albany State College in Georgia, provided the soundtrack to the mass movement that was taking place in that era. Organizations like the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, known as SNCC, began using this music as a tool for progress.

The Freedom Singers were organized by Cordell Reagon in 1962. After witnessing the power of the singing in the Albany mass meetings, Pete Seeger suggested to James Forman that a singing group would be very supportive of the organization in building support, sharing information and raising funds. Cordell, one of the SNCC field secretaries who came to Albany, Georgia in 1961, was a tenor singer out of the Nashville sit-in movement. The youngest member of SNCCs staff, by 1961 he had been on the Freedom Rides, working in voter registration and participated in sit-in demonstrations. He formed the first group of Freedom Singers from the movements he had been active in across the country.

Overall, the power of congregational-style singing, fused with Black Baptist acappella church singing and protest songs and chants, became instrumental in empowering and educating listeners about civil rights issues. It was also a powerful social weapon of influence in the fight against Jim Crow segregation.

Today on Sojourner Truth, we continue our 7-part series on the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, known as SNCC, focusing on musician, actor and civil rights activist Harry Belafonte.

During this episode, Part 4 of our series, you will hear a speech delivered by Belafonte at the SNCC 50th anniversary conference. A child of Jamaican immigrants, Belafonte depicted the struggles of Black people in the United States, the Caribbean, and Africa through his Calypso music. Inspired by activists Paul Robeson and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Belafonte played an instrumental role in funding the southern Civil Rights Movement, including the 1961 Freedom Rides and SNCC during the Mississippi Freedom Summer of 1964. He also helped to organize the 1963 March on Washington, participated in SNCC's day-to-day work on the ground in Mississippi.

Today on Sojourner Truth, we continue our 7-part series on the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee known as SNCC, focusing on civil rights activist and singer Bernice Johnson Reagon.

Johnson Reagon is the founder of the Harambee Singers and the all-woman acappella group Sweet Honey and the Rock. She uses her powerful singing to allow others to study the African American oral tradition in radio, film, and concerts across the country.

During this episode, Part 3 of our series, you will hear a speech delivered by Johnson Reagon at the SNCC 50th anniversary conference.

Today on Sojourner Truth, we continue our 7-part series on the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, known as SNCC. During Part 2 of the series, you will hear more voices of some of the women who organized with SNCC, including Mary King, who worked in SNCCs Communications Department in the 1960s, pressing for more media coverage of racist violence in the United States. We also hear from historian Cynthia Fleming, who discusses the life and work of SNCC organizer Ruby Doris Smith-Robinson. Other featured speakers include Maria Varela and Martha Prescod Norman Noonan.