From: "James Anderson" <andy.anderson@louisville.edu>
Sent: Thursday, July 19, 2001 7:53 PM
Subject: Freedom Summer Letters and Posters Available Online
FREEDOM SUMMER LETTERS AND POSTERS AVAILABLE ONLINE
The USM Libraries' Special Collections Digital Program announces the
online release of correspondence and civil rights posters from the
Joseph and
Nancy Ellin Freedom Summer Collection. The Ellins, ivy-league educated
teachers from New York City, came to Hattiesburg, Mississippi, in 1964
to work in the Freedom Schools established as a part of the Mississippi
Freedom Summer Project.
The letters describe the Ellins' daily activities and concerns as civil
rights workers, their relationships with local blacks, and their
attempts to promote grass roots support for civil rights among their
friends and
relatives back home. The posters from the Ellin collection are public
relations publications of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
(SNCC).
The finding aid for the Ellin collection (with hyperlinks to the digital
items) is available at: http://www.lib.usm.edu/~archives/m323.htm
The digital files from the Ellin collection, along with the rest of
USM's digital archives, are searchable from:
http://anna.lib.usm.edu/uhtbin/cgisirsi/x/0/57/49?user_id=ARCHIVE
The Mississippi Freedom Summer Project was a key event in the history of
the civil rights movement that brought together northern whites and
African-American activists in a campaign to establish Freedom Schools
and Libraries and to promote black voting rights. The summer
crusade--and
the white reaction to it--brought the plight of southern blacks into the
national spotlight in 1964. Events like those associated with the
murders of civil rights activists Andrew Goodman, Michael Schwerner, and
James
Chaney in Neshoba County deeply affected the national conscience, and
they ultimately helped to change Americans' perceptions and behavior in
regard to race.
Hattiesburg, Mississippi, where the Ellin's spent July and August of
1964, was the largest Freedom Summer site.
The Ellin digital collection is a phase of the Civil Rights in
Mississippi Digital Archive, which provides oral histories, manuscripts,
and images
documenting the history of race relations in Mississippi. See:
http://www.lib.usm.edu/~spcol/crda/
USM also has a large collection of editorial cartoons online. They can
be accessed at http://www.lib.usm.edu/~spcol/aaec/
For more information contact: spcol@lib.usm.edu
********************************************
Diane DeCesare Ross
Digitization Specialist
The University of Southern Mississippi
McCain Library & Archives
Special Collections Digital Lab
Box 5148
Hattiesburg, MS 39406-5148
email: Diane.Ross@usm.edu
fax: 601-266-6269
phone: 601-266-6493
Send snail mail to: Andy Anderson
Photographic Archives
Ekstrom Library
University of Louisville
Louisville, KY 40292
502/852-6752
502/852-8734 fax
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Fri Jul 20 2001 - 07:09:37 EDT