MEET: Dr. C.T. Vivian. A Baptist minister, Vivian is a living legend in the civil right movement, having joined the SCLC executive staff alongside Martin Luther King Jr. in 1963. He took part in lunch-counter sit-ins and Freedom Rides to protest segregation in the early 1960s; he was arrested after one Freedom Ride in 1961 and sent to Parchman Prison, where he was beaten by guards. He is perhaps best known for his altercation on March 7, 1965 – Bloody Sunday – with Sheriff Jim Clark, who punched Vivian on the courthouse steps in Selma, Ala., as he tried to escort a group of African Americans inside to register to vote. The television news coverage of that days police brutality was an eye-opener for the American public, and Bloody Sunday was a driving force behind President Lyndon Johnsons signing of the Voting Rights Act in August 1965.
Posted on: Thu, 14 Nov 2013 10:25:14 +0000
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