A Woman to Know: Diane Nash
Freedom is people realizing they are their own leader. — Diane
(image via The Washington Post)
Diane Nash shaped many of the pivotal moments that defined Civil Rights Era progress: she intregrated lunch counters in Nashville; she co-founded the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee to organize college activists; and she marched in Selma and other Southern cities; she connected activists in Tennessee and beyond.
But Diane is most renowned for her role as a Freedom Rider, one of several civil rights activists who boarded buses throughout the South to protest continued segregation in the 1960s. Diane was a primary organizer of the demonstration as well as a rider herself; as she later recalled,
I think people rely too heavily on elected officials to make things happen. I'd like people to think how long it might have taken to get the right to vote, to desegregate the public accommodations and interstate travel if we'd waited for an elected official. We had to take responsibility for change ourselves, or we might still be waiting.
🙏 Diane. 🙏
Add to your reading list:
The Shadows of Youth: The Remarkable Journey of the Civil Rights Generation (Andrew B. Lewis)
Diane Nash: The Fire of the Civil Rights Movement (Lisa Mullins)
Freedom's Daughters: The Unsung Heroines of the Civil Rights Movement (Lynne Olson)
Read more:
Journey to Freedom: Retrace the Freedom Rides (Oprah.com)
Civil Rights leader reflects on 50th anniversary of freedom rides (Chicago Tribune)
Why civil rights leader Diane Nash refused to march at Selma this weekend (The Washington Post)
The director of the African-American history museum weighs in on Selma (Smithsonian)
New books examine key eras and figures in the civil rights movement (BookPage)
Freedom Riders (Library of Congress)
Years after change, activist lives her convictions (USA Today)
Watch more:
Diane Nash: Civil Rights Leader (Makers)
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