August 27th, 2010 marks the 50th Anniversary of the incident known as Ax Handle Saturday, when members of the NAACP Youth Council came together to protest segregated lunch counters in downtown Jacksonville and were confronted by an angry, ax-wielding white mob of klansmen that attacked bystanders.
Today, young people are still dealing with crucial issues of injustice and inequality in our community. As part of a series of events taking place August 25th- 28th in reflection of Ax Handle Saturday, the Ritz will host a Caucus bringing together today’s Young Leaders on Thursday, August 26 at 6:00 PM.
THE CAUCUS PART I: Voice of the Future
Young leaders (Generation X) of color convene to outline a focus strategy and commitment to enhance our social, political, economic, educational, environmental and global future. THE CAUCUS, a new initiative creating leadership strategies through action plans that will build bridges and implement positive and sustainable change in the Jacksonville community.
The purpose of the “Circle of Change” discussion is to inspire activism and empower all attendees with the reminder that in their individual efforts they have a responsibility to lead. During the main event each participant will take a pledge to work on better understanding and mitigating the issues surrounding racial segregation and social separation in our society.
For more on Ax Handle Day in Jacksonville, please review >
The Jacksonville Branch NAACP 50th Anniversary Commemoration of the 1960 Sit-ins and Ax Handle Saturday
Kweisi Mfume, Rev. Rudolph W. McKissick Sr., Charles Cobb Jr., Stetson Kennedy, Sandra Birnhak, Dr. James Loewen, Dr. Arnett Girardeau, and Rodney L. Hurst, Sr. are featured speakers when the Jacksonville Branch NAACP commemorates the 50th Anniversary of the 1960 Sit-ins and Ax Handle Saturday. On August 27, 1960, after peacefully protesting racism and segregation by demonstrating at segregated white lunch counters in downtown Jacksonville for two weeks, more than 200 white males with ax handles and baseball bats attacked members of the Jacksonville Youth Council NAACP. The Press called that day, Ax Handle Saturday.
Four days of commemorative activities will begin Wednesday August 25, 2010 at 6:00 pm with a Welcoming Program at the Ritz Theatre and Museum featuring discussions with: Stetson Kennedy – Folklorist and author; Charles Cobb Jr, author, National Association of Black Journalists Hall of Fame member, Co-Founder-Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, and currently the Senior Diplomatic Correspondent of Allafrica.com; and Former Florida State Senator Arnett Girardeau. Rodney L. Hurst, Sr., author, and President of the 1960 Jacksonville Youth Council NAACP, will moderate. Jacksonville Branch NAACP President, Isaiah Rumlin, calls the Welcoming Program and the evening, “…a real step back to 1960”. In addition to the speakers sharing their experiences and interacting with the audience, the Ritz Theatre and Museum will showcase its expanded Civil Rights memorabilia exhibit.
Dr. James Loewen, celebrated author of several critically acclaimed books including Lies My Teacher Told Me-What Your American History Textbook Got Wrong, Sundown Towns, and his recently published book, The Confederate and Neo-Confederate Reader will speak in the Historic Sanctuary of the Bethel Baptist Institutional Church Friday, August 27, 2010 at 12:00 Noon. An educator who attended Carleton College, Loewen holds a Ph.D. in sociology from Harvard University, and taught race relations for twenty years at the University of Vermont. Prior to that, he taught at Mississippi’s Tougaloo College, a historically Black College. He now lives in Washington, D.C., continuing his research on how Americans remember their past. Loewen has been an expert witness in more than 50 civil rights, voting rights, and employment cases. His awards include the First Annual Spivack Award of the American Sociological Association for “sociological research applied to the field of intergroup relations,” the American Book Award (for Lies My Teacher Told Me), and the Oliver Cromwell Cox Award for Distinguished Anti-Racist Scholarship. He is also Distinguished Lecturer for the Organization of American Historians. His recently published book, The Confederate and Neo-Confederate Reader gives resounding documentary proof that the original reasoning behind secession and subsequent myth-making was in defense of slavery and white supremacy.
Later that evening Friday, August 27, 2010 at 7:30 pm, internationally renowned theologian Rev. Rudolph W. McKissick Sr., Senior Pastor of the Bethel Baptist Institutional Church will address the 50th Anniversary NAACP Commemorative Mass Meeting in the Main Sanctuary of Bethel on this actual 50 year Anniversary date of Ax Handle Saturday. Many 1960 Jacksonville Youth Council NAACP members and NAACP Officials from around the country will attend this commemorative program, along with a host of special guests. Look for special historical surprises that night. The evening will also feature the acclaimed Bethel Baptist Institutional Church Mass Choir and the Attitudes Performing Arts Studio.
Distinguished Film Producer Sandra Birnhak will host Jacksonville’s first Civil Rights Film Festival at the Ritz Theatre and Museum, Saturday August 28, 2010 at 10:00 am. The Kuumba Festival of Florida will take place at 501 Davis Street, Jacksonville, Fl 32202.
Scarred Justice: The Orangeburg Massacre 1968 brings to light one of the bloodiest tragedies of the Civil Rights era after four decades of deliberate denial. The killing of four white students at Kent State University in 1970 left an indelible stain on our national consciousness. But most Americans know nothing of the three black students killed at South Carolina State College in Orangeburg two years earlier. This scrupulously researched documentary finally offers the definitive account of that tragic incident and reveals the environment that allowed it to be buried for so long. It raises disturbing questions about how our country acknowledges its tortured racial past in order to make sense of its challenging present.
“This documentary should be shown in every schoolroom in America. We might then create a new generation of activists, emulating the heroic young people of that time, moving this country towards new levels of equality and justice.” Howard Zinn, American Historian and Political Activist (1922-2010)
Award Winning Film, Home of the Brave, narrated by Stockard Channing, examines the life of Viola Liuzzo, a 39-year-old mother of five, who was the only white woman killed during the civil rights movement. This powerful and poignant documentary rescues from obscurity Liuzzo’s tragic untold story. Dramatic archival footage recaptures this turbulent era, and compelling interviews with her children paint a vivid portrait of a shattered family determined to uncover the truth about their mother’s murder, and the government’s campaign to smear her name.
“A serenely powerful, handcrafted film that navigates into a place Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once called ‘the tangled discords of our nation.” Daily Variety Award Winning film, Freedom Never Dies: The Legacy of Harry T. Moore is narrated by Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee. Sweet Honey In The Rock and Toshi Reagon perform original music. On Christmas night 1951, Harry T. Moore and his wife Harriette retired to bed in their white frame house tucked inside a small orange grove in Mims, Florida. Ten minutes later, a bomb shattered their house, their lives, and any notions that the South’s post-war transition to racial equality would be a smooth one. Harry Moore died that night, his wife nine days later. Harry T. Moore paved the way for the ‘60s civil rights movement by championing equal pay for black teachers, organizing the black vote and publicly condemning racist attitudes and actions of local, state and national officials. Despite a massive FBI investigation and repeated inquisitions, the murders of Harry and Harriette Moore have never been solved.
GIST TV….. “Florida’s dark past is detailed in this beautifully filmed, sobering and deeply moving profile.”
Kweisi Mfume wraps up the four commemorative days on Saturday, August 28, 2010 at 7:30 pm when he addresses the Jacksonville Branch NAACP 45TH Annual Freedom Fund Dinner at the Hyatt Regency Jacksonville Riverfront. A former US Congressman, prominent civil rights advocate, former head of the NAACP, and sought after keynote speaker, Mfume was recently selected to lead the National Medical Association (NMA). The NMA is the nation’s largest medical association representing the interests of more than 30,000 African American physicians and their patients. Having spent nine years at the helm of the NAACP, and now as the head of the NMA, Mfume’s understanding of health disparities in the nation’s healthcare delivery system, and the devastating effects such disparities have on the lives of American families, is a message itself.
Tickets for the Dinner are $60.00 and are available by contacting the NAACP Office at 904 764-7578… Isaiah Rumlin 904 764-1753… Elnora Atkins 904 768-8697… Sandra Thompson 904 768-1086…or Rodney L. Hurst, Sr. 904 764-9038. Corporate sponsored tables are also available.
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