Fannie Lou Hamer

We drove down to Ruleville, Mississippi to see the Fannie Lou Hamer Memorial Garden with the statue they dedicated in 2012:

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Fannie Lou Hamer Voting and Civil Rights Pioneer
1962 – Joined the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and became a field secretary
1963 – Severely beaten while in Winona, Mississippi when she and other civil rights workers were returning from a SCLC Citizenship Training Conference
Became one of first black persons to register to vote in Sunflower county
Ran for Congress in the Second Congressional District
1964 – Founding member of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) and led the MFDP challenge before the National Democratic Party Credentials Committee in Atlantic City, New Jersey
1968 – Founder of the Freedom Farms Corporation (FFC)
1970 – Founder of the Fannie Lou Hamer Day Care Center, Ruleville, MS
1971 – Became a member of the Policy Council of the National Council of Negro Women, Inc. and a member of the Women’s Political Caucas
1974 – She was named to the Board of Trustees of the Martin Luther King Center for Nonviolent Social Change

Fannie Lou Hamer Memorial Garden, Ruleville MS

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This sign was placed in 2011 during the 50th anniversary of the Freedom Riders:

In 1962 at age 44, Hamer tried to register to vote; the next day she was fired from her job on the plantation east of here. She became a civil rights activist, opening her Ruleville home to Freedom Summer workers and other activists. She earned a reputation as an electrifying speaker, especially as a delegate of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party at the 1964 Democratic National Convention. She fought racism, injustice, and poverty until her death in 1977.