Last week, to celebrate the 60th Annivrsary of the Mississsippi Freedom Summer Project, I told how I became involved with it, along with the pastor from the same North Dakota town, the Rev. Roger Smith. As a result of our experiences together during our two weeks in that state we became life-long friends. This week—in Part 2 of this series—I want to highlight three of my journal posts, and for those who want more details, will include the links to them.
I described our time of orientation in Jackson, MS and our visit to the HQ of our sponsor The Council of Federated Organizations.
Part 2 of my journal deals with our arrival in the little town of Shaw, our home for the next 2 weeks :
Dated Thursday, August 6, 1964.
“We pulled into Shaw about 4:30 P Mon Thurs. and promptly got lost due to the poor directions given us. We finally found the Freedom House, just a few minutes before the Jackson office was to call to check that we had arrived.
“The Freedom House, of course, is located in what is referred to as the Negro section of town. In Shaw this is the north end, separated from the main section by a stream (or bayou). The white section is quite lovely – shady, tree lined streets, neat, trimmed yards & modern houses along with the usual assortment of beautiful and garish old houses. The downtown center is a little different—the street is very narrow, the sidewalks even more so, making it appear from a distance that the stores are built right onto the street. The effect was similar to some of the towns & villages in French Canada.
“This Negro section almost defies description. The accounts given by various journalists of the lot of Negroes is by no means exaggerated. As we got out of the car at one place we were warned, “Be careful of the ditch there. It’s an open sewer.” And sure enough it was!
“Not only are there no regular sewers here, there are also no street lights (except along the north-south highway at the edge of the section where white folks drive by), no sidewalks, no paved streets. Most of the houses have no indoor water supply. Many do not even have an out-house. You have to look hard for a house that’s painted. Many have porches rotting away. Many Peace Corpsmen will find better living conditions in other parts of the world than in Shaw, Miss., U.S.A.”
I then wrote at length about the students and their dispute with their principal, which led to their boycotting their school, thus freeing them for volunteering for COFO’s summer voting registration drive. You may ask, “But it was August, Isn’t school out then anyway for summer vacation?” The answer to that is Not in Mississipi, where cotton is still important. School was arranged around cotton, with students in school during August and then let out in September so they can help in the harvest.
In Part 3 of my journal I am still dealing with events during the first day of our arrival in Shaw. We went to a Freedom Rally in Cleveland, the county seat of Bolivar County (which I describe in some detail). Then I moved on to an account of our attending a Freedom Rally up in Mound Bayou. This is a unique town in that it was founded by former slaves in 1887 and was the only entirely Black-run community. During the next two weeks we would go there to mail letters that we did not want the Shaw postal clerk to see, as well as to make sure we were not cheated on postage, which had happened.
“We left the Cleveland Rally to go up to Mound Bayou where still another Freedom Rally was in session. Mound Bayou is quite a unique community. It’s the largest all Negro town in Miss. The stores, civic offices, schools – all are in the hands of Negroes. The Rally was held in a large A.M.E. Church. There must have been about 100–120 people there listening to a rather inane talk by one of the COFO Volunteers. A minister-counselor gave an excellent talk based on Jonah and the great fish. He compared Jonah’s reluctance to do his duty to that of many of the Negroes; he warned them that they too could be gobbled up.
“John Bradford, the County COFO Director spoke briefly and was followed by the Rev. Surney who proceeded to really stir up the crowd. Speaking rapidly in the Mississippi dialect, he was hard to follow at first, but what we Northerners could catch sounded good. He was really giving hell to those who haven’t become involved in the movement. Especially to Negro preachers. Mincing no words, he made it clear that in his opinion they were the devil’s workers doomed to hell. Dennis F. of Shaw challenged the group to improve their inept singing, which they did admirably. The meeting closed as customary with the crowd joining hands and singing “We Shall Overcome.”
Virtually every Freedom Rally ended with the singing of “We Shall Overcome.” It was sung with such fervor that ever since I have had trouble singing it up North where few in a gathering had experienced it in Mississippi. No one sang it amidst such risk of danger as those African American SNCC workers and share croppers that summer. When they sang the verse “We Are Not Afraid,” they were trying to convince themselves that this was true:
“After the meeting I met a number of people, including a young boy just entering high school. He spoke like an evangelist, speaking of the great need for the Gospel and its message of love which can change men’s hearts. Our trip back was another sober reminder of the danger of traveling at night through hostile Mississippi. Since we were a mixed group, our car was marked as that of “those agitators.” Before we passed a slow moving car we tried to see if the occupants were white or not. Usually they were Negro, but once we passed a white man’s car, the group urged me to press on with due speed—though not too fast due to the sudden vigilance of the police and their great concern that C-R workers follow the letter of the law. (No doubt they’re solicitous of our health and safety!) It was also standard operating procedure to have Negro boys and the white girls sit apart, either all in front or the back. We made it back with no trouble, congregated for a while at the Freedom House and finally went to our homes.”
Fear was a factor we dealt with every day, especially when darkness fell. We remembered the warning not to sit in front of an open window at night or to go anywhere alone. Also when traveling, to let the volunteer on phone duty at Shaw know of a delay if we would not make it back at our estimated time of return. And at Shaw, Blacks who came out to the evening Freedom Rally had to walk past a white cop who was writing in his notebook the names of those entering the church. Just attending a Rally took courage, with the probability of news of their attendance would be spread among whites.
In Part 4 of the Journal I get more personal by describing the slanting shack that Roger and I rented because all of the locals able and willing to house volunteers were full up. The following excerpts were written on Aug. 10, 1964:
“I must describe “home.” It is a lovely old white wooden structure—or once was white. The lumber must have been milled in Reconstruction days judging by the appearance of it. The front porch threatens to cave in at any moment. You have to be very careful where you step or the rotten wooden floor will give way—it already has in many places. The porch is supposedly screened in, but this is in such bad shape that it merely slows down the bugs. Several hundred books are stacked on the porch, adding to the danger of imminent collapse. The lady who owns the house has moved out and is renting it to us for $10 a week—each.
“Our water comes out of a faucet in the back yard. There is no stove, nor is there a refrigerator, hence all of our washing and shaving water is unheated. There is a slight odor around the place, especially at the rear of the house where we wash. The outhouse serves not only us, but a number of others also. Oh yes, I forgot the other tenant of the house—a non-paying one at that—a rat. We only hear him at night as he gnaws and scratches his way about. We seldom, if ever, see him. I think this morning I spied him out of the corner of my eye as he dashed from beneath the house to the sanctuary of the tall grass and weeds nearby. He has been feasting upon an old loaf of bread left by our land-lady, but so far he has not really bothered us. We seem to have a mutual live-and-let-live pact worked out.
There is more about the ever-present dust and the difficulty with hygiene due to the scarcity of water and the debilitating heat and humidity. Other details are mentioned, of which I’ll include a short account of a staff meeting, which took place on Tues., Aug. 11:
“We were to have a staff meeting at 9:30 Friday morning. It seems to be the usual case. It didn’t get started until just before 11. During the waiting period we talked, read, & I took Charles out to his Grandmother’s to get his clothes for a trip.
“Our meeting was worthwhile when it finally started. We planned a freedom school & talked about the program in general. Lunch consisted of a hamburger in a local grocery store-restaurant…”
Next time I will post excerpts from Parts 5, 6, & 7 of my Journal. These deal with our visits with sharecroppers, an investigation of a cross burning, observations on “the Two Souths, and more.
To read all the details, here are links to these journal entries that originally were posted online a decade ago for the 50th anniversary of Freedom S?ummer.
A fine film about the murder of Emmett Till, which hung over the state is:
Finally, I urge people to read this wonderful book about Medgar Evers
