by Marcus Brooks

Created on: February 22, 2008   Last Updated: October 31, 2008

The Selma march in 1965 displayed how determined people were at creating change. Participants from all across America came to a dusty, Alabama town during a muggy spring. Northern whites and Negroes joined Southern whites and Negroes in the spirit of protest. Jim Crow's tyranny was suffocating the nation. Nonviolent, mass action needed to stop it.

During the civil rights movement, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Baynard Rustin and Rosa Parks were celebrities. However, it took more than big names to overcome racism and white terror. The Movement had its unsung heroes. People gave their lives in doing the menial tasks, like bussing marchers, printing flyers and knocking on black peoples' doors. They lived under the fear of being targeted for arrest by police or for intimidation or murder by Klu Klux Klansmen. One unsung hero was a Detroit housewife of three children.

Viola Liuzzo arrived in March 1965. In her early thirties, she enjoyed a quiet life. Her husband, Anthony Liuzzo was a teamster for the union. She settled for raising her family at home. But, a nationwide broadcast changed her forever. Allegedly, she watched Negroes endure "Bloody Sunday" in a failed march through Selma. She watched troopers on horses beat and batter old women, men and young children senselessly. She had seen the tearful victims rubbing their eyes after police dispensed tear gas. After sobbing for hours, Liuzzo told her loved ones that she had to go down and help. She drove her Oldsmobile and began shuttling CORE (Congress for Racial Equality) workers and activists to and from daily meetings. There were great obstacles in helping Southern Negroes obtain their human rights.

1) Police harassment
2) Klu Klux Klan
3) White Citizen's Council
4) An unsympathetic population

Activists and volunteers were warned never to travel at night. They heard the gruesome accounts of three CORE workers during Freedom Summer 1964. Andrew Goodman, Michael Schwerner and James Chaney got pulled over by deputies in rural Mississippi. After being detained, they were released, and later were set upon. Their burned-out, station wagon was found in a swamp. Weeks later, it took 200 Marines and FBI to dig up their bodies from an earthen dam. Traveling at night had lethal consequences.

Unfortunately, one night a meeting ran late. Ms. Liuzzo drove on an Alabama taking Lawrence Moten, a CORE volunteer home. He sat passenger side. Four Klansmen "on patrol" spotted an Oldsmobile with Michigan plates. They pursued it at high speed.

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