The Lee statue has been removed, and it will be replaced by a statue of Ms. Johns after a formal vote of the Virginia State Legislature occurs.

(10/10)

On December 16, 2020, Virginia's Commission on Historical Statues in the United States Capitol voted to recommend that a statue of Barbara Johns represent Virginia in the National Statuary Hall, in place of the current statue of Robert E. Lee.

(9/10)

In 2017, the Virginia state legislature passed a resolution designating April 23, 2018, and every successive April 23, as Barbara Johns Day in the Commonwealth.

(8/10)

Those of us who live in the Philadelphia area can claim a small part of Barbara Johns' legacy. She received a degree in library science from Drexel University, lived in Philadelphia, and served as a librarian for the Philadelphia school system until she passed away in 1991.

(7/10)

I was lucky enough to visit The National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington DC this past December, where I was able to view its exhibits relating to Barbara Johns and her courageous story. (If you haven't been to the Museum yet, I highly recommend it.)

(6/10)

Change did not come easily. After the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Brown, the local county school board chose to shut down the public schools rather than desegregate them.

(5/10)

That case was one of several cases that were consolidated into what became known as Brown v. Board of Education. It was the only case arising from a student strike.

(4/10)

Ms. Johns sought legal counsel, and the striking students' cause was eventually taken up by the NAACP, which filed a federal lawsuit in 1953 challenging racial segregation in schools.

(3/10)

In 1951, Barbara Johns, at the age of 16, organized and led a peaceful student strike to protest the appalling conditions of her segregated high school. Her school was an overcrowded temporary tar paper structure that was heated with wood stoves and lacked indoor plumbing.

(2/10)

You can read more about Dr. King's Beloved Community and his philosophy of nonviolence on The King Center's website here: thekingcenter.org/about-tkc/th...

Happy Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, everyone.

Dr. King was organizing for jobs, wages and economic equity (and, of course, voting rights) at the same time that he was sharing his extraordinary vision of the Beloved Community as something that was achievable.

I am awed by the moral, legal and physical courage of the participants in the American civil rights movement.

I particularly admire Dr. King for the way his faith, morality, courage, and intellect enabled him to lead philosophical and practical movements towards justice simultaneously.

You can read more about the history of the SCLC's Operation Breadbasket at the King Institute's webpage on the topic: kinginstitute.stanford.edu/operation-br... .

We tend to hear a lot about Dr. King as a dreamer, but we usually hear relatively little about Dr. King as a practical organizer.

If the statistics showed a problem, the ministers would attempt to negotiate more equitable employment practices with the business. If the business refused, the ministers would encourage their parishioners to boycott or picket the business.

These practices proved to be very successful.

Operation Breadbasket organized black clergy to gather employment statistics for businesses serving black communities, so they could determine whether those businesses were failing to employ a representative share of black people or failing to provide more senior roles to their black employees.

The Southern Christian Leadership Conference's Operation Breadbasket was modeled after a selective patronage program developed by Rev. Leon Sullivan in Philadelphia, PA. (Rev. Sullivan has a remarkable legacy of his own, which you can read more about here: thesullivantrust.org/our-founder/ )