Bayard Rustin: Civil Rights Organizer & Activist
Bayard Rustin (1912-1987)
An American Leader in Civil rights, Nonviolence and Gay Rights
Bayard Rustin
Bayard Rustin was born in West Chester, Pennsylvania, in March of 1912. His grandmother was a member of the NAACP, and W.E.B. Du Bois and James Weldon Johnson were pretty constant guests at his grandparents home. This exposure gave him the desire to start campaigning at a very young age. He knew was gay at a very young age and when he told his grandmother that he liked to spend time with boys more than girls, she didn’t hesitate and just replied with “I suppose that’s what you need to do.”
Rustin attended Wilberforce University and Cheyney State Teachers College (now Cheyney University). He then moved to New York in 1937 and attended City College. He joined the Young Communitist League (YCL) because he thought they were committed to social justice. As it turns out, the YCL started to shift their focus away from the civil rights movement in 1941 so he left.
After leaving the YCL, Justin became youth organizer of the proposed 1941 March on Washington, by A. Philip Randolph, the trade union leader. He then joined the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR) and co-founded Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). His position was to lead workshops about nonviolent action through his field secretary and race relations director jobs with the organizations. He refused to be drafted and spent more than 2 years in jail as a conscientious objector.
Then in 1947, he was arrested again for CORE’s “Journey of Reconciliation” also known as the “First Freedom Ride.” It was to test the Supreme Court's rulings on segregation on interstate bus travel. After spending 22 days in a chain gang while in prison, he later published a report in several newspapers that led to reform of prison chain gangs.
Rustin started to travel the world and in 1948 he learned about the Gandhian nonviolence philosophy in India. In 1953, he went on a sponsored trip to Africa through FOR and the American Friends Service Committee to work on West African independence movements. But sadly he was arrested and told to resign because he was homosexual.
Rustin became Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s advisor during the Montgomery bus boycott and he published the “Montgomery Diary” in 1956. He provided Dr. King with lots of knowledge on nonviolent tactics and ideas. Dr. King knew Rustin’s background was controversial because he was part of a communist group and also homosexuality was still extremely frowned upon but Dr. King saw his hard work, strategizing and organizational skills. He began to act as Dr. King’s nonviolence strategist, proofreader, ghostwriter, philosophy teacher and more.
Rustin played a major part in developing the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) to unite black leaders in the South. He is also an important player in the 1957 Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom. He then organized the 1959 Youth Marches for Integrated Schools.
In 1963, Rustin became director of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Organizing the momentous event that had over 200,000 attendees and became Rustin started serving as president and then co-chair, of the A. Philip Randolph Institute in 1965. His goal was to form alliances between blacks, liberals, laborers and religious groups. Rustin passed away just 4 days before the anniversary of the march in Washington on August 24, 1987.
Works Cited:
Gates Jr, Henry Louis. “Who Designed the March on Washington?” PBS. January 2020.
Charity Adams Earley: A Pioneer For African American Women
Charity Adams Earley (1918-2002)
A Pioneer for African American Women in the Military and Education
Charity Adams Earley
Charity Adams Earley was born on December 5, 1918, in Kittrell, North Carolina. Earley’s parents believed very strongly in education and pushed her and her siblings to excel in everything they did. Several years ahead of her peers, Earley graduated from Booker T. Washington High School as valedictorian.
While on scholarship at Ohio State University, Earley studied mathematics, Latin, physics, history and education. She belonged to the school’s branch of the NAACP, Delta Sigma Theta, and Women's Self-Governing Association. After receiving her Bachelors of Arts in 1938, she taught junior high math and science. During her summers, she studied for her Masters in Vocational Psychology.
When WWII broke out the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps was created and Earley applied and got accepted in July of 1942. She was stationed at Fort Des Moines for 2 years. She went from staff training officer to a station control officer and then company commander. In 1943, she was promoted to major, which made her the first African-American woman and highest ranking female officer at the training center.
In 1944, Early became commanding officer of the first battalion of African-American women to serve overseas during World War II (the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion). While serving, Earley never accepted racism. A general once threatened to assign a white first lieutenant and told Earley to “show her how to run this unit.” Earley replied with, “Over my dead body, sir.” She knew that she was the best for the job. She even pushed her unit to not accept segregated quarters and ordered them to socialize with the white soldiers and citizens. With time, her persistence and leadership created a culture of comradeship.
On December 26, 1945, Earley was promoted to lieutenant colonel for her work in the WAC. After her time in the military, Earley finished her Masters and then became dean at Tennessee State University and Georgia State University. She later moved to Germany for several years while her husband finished medical school. Early learned how to speak German fluently in 10 months at Minerva Institute in Germany. She then spent two years at the University of Zurich and then took some courses at the Jungian Institute of Analytical Psychology.
In the 50’s, Earley went back to the US doing civic work in Ohio, sitting on several local boards. She later founded the Black Leadership Development Program (BLDP) in Dayton in 1982 and helped create Parity Inc. in 2000. In 1996, Early was honored in a ceremony at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum for her achievements and contributions in WWII. Charity Adams Earley passed away at 83 on January 13, 2002.
Works Cited:
CAC Celebrates Black History Month All February
Celebrating Black History Month!
Here at Commonwealth Alternative Care we are celebrating Black History Month by spreading a little knowledge!
Here at Commonwealth Alternative Care we are celebrating Black History Month by spreading a little knowledge! We are learning about influential African-American men and women in history, you may or may not know of. Most of us are well versed in many of the accomplishments of Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks, Frederick Douglass, Maya Angelou and many other well known influential people of color whose efforts, struggles and stories have changed the course of history, however we will share biographies and interesting facts every week on African-American men and women that are not as frequently taught about. These people have paved the way for so much growth in American society, and the rest of the world but maybe didn’t get as much recognition for it. So stay tuned and thank you for learning with us!
Charity Adams Earley
The History of Black History Month
In 1976, the nation's bicentennial, we started celebrating Black History as a month, but did you know that the honoring of Black History in the US started as a week long observance? This observance and celebration is thanks to Carter G. Woodson, a Harvard trained historian who believed that “reason would prevail over prejudice”. In 1915, the national celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of emancipation was held at the Coliseum in Washington DC, where Woodson traveled from Chicago to set up a Black History display at the exhibit that saw up to 12,000 observers. Before he left DC, Woodson and his friends, who came along from Chicago, decided to found the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History or ASNLH (later the Association for the Study of African American Life and History or ASALH). Several years after the ASNLH created and they announced Negro History Week in 1925.
Frederick Douglass
The first observance of this celebration was held on the week of both Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln’s birthdays in February of 1926. The response was absolutely overwhelming, with teachers, historians, and progressive white allies wanting to endorse and share in their efforts. They had a hard time meeting the demand of so many people around the country but they overcame the challenge. The ASNLH created lessons, provided pictures, created historical plays, and even made posters with important people and dates to remember. To keep up, Branches of ASNLH formed all over the country and cities and towns observed and promote the importance of the weeklong celebration.
Woodson believed for a long time that his efforts would not continue but would actually just come to an end after his passing. Little did he know, in the 1940s and after his passing in the 1950s, Negro History Week became fundamental to the lives of African-Americans for progression and integration into society. In the Black Awakening of the 1960s, the observance of Black History helped fuel the civil rights movement because the portrayal of people of color was no longer only in the hands of racist politicians, scientists and media outlets. For far too long, racist images, journals and ideas were flooding communities but through the expanding of education in black history and culture, Woodson and so many others changed the course of American History forever.
Martin Luther King Jr.
When the national bicentennial happened in 76’, the celebration of Black History went from being observed in one week to a full month throughout the country. On this day, Gerald R. Ford pushed Americans to “seize the opportunity to honor the too-often neglected accomplishments of black Americans in every area of endeavor throughout our history.” Since that day, every president, Democrat and Republican, has issued proclamations endorsing the observance of Black History Month the annual theme put out by ASALH. The theme for 2020 is“African-Americans and the vote” because this year marks the sesquicentennial of the Fifteenth Amendment (1870), when black men got the right to vote and the centennial of the Nineteenth Amendment (1920), when women got the right to vote. Click on this link for more on this year’s theme: https://asalh.org/black-history-themes/
Come by and visit us at CAC and check out our website and social media for more information. And remember, keep learning, spreading knowledge and share your stories with us; we are here to listen and learn! Happy Black History Month!
Bayard Rustin