In 1961, hundreds of volunteers from across the country traveled to the South to challenge segregation in interstate bus travel. Known collectively as Freedom Riders, the volunteers met violent resistance and arrest, but their courage helped dismantle discrimination against African Americans. 

Forty years later, many of those Freedom Riders returned to Jackson, Mississippi, to celebrate their accomplishments. The Center was able to document this significant event as Southern Studies graduate students collected oral histories at the 40th anniversary reunion, held this past November.

The students filmed more than 40 interviews, each of which lasted between 30 minutes and an hour. The original tapes will be archived in Special Collections in the John D. Williams Library, where they will be available to students and researchers.

The effort in Jackson is part of a larger project led by graduate students Joe York and Amy Evans to produce a series of documentary films about the civil rights movement. Although planning for the project is in the preliminary phase, the students hope to include the films as the centerpiece of a curriculum for teaching the history of the civil rights movement to high school students. The initial plans for the venture also call for an interactive Web site that would allow for the viewer to download the films as an accompaniment to relevant text.

York sees the project as a valuable tool in the continuing struggle for civil rights. "To inspire students to take an active role in investigating their own past, their present social surroundings," he said, "and to take an active interest in the future of their world . . . that is what the project hopes to do; promote awareness through interesting, engaging, and compelling information."

York and Evans gave a Brown Bag program at the Center on January 23. They previewed the rough cut of the first installment of the films, titled A Documentary on Progress. Produced without the benefit of professional editing equipment, the film highlights the interviews with several Freedom Riders, as well as comments from James Forman, secretary of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee from 1961 to1966.

Susan Glisson, assistant director of the Center, responded to the initial efforts with enthusiasm. "I can’t begin to tell how great the documentary is," Glisson said. "For all the rough technical aspects, the story is compelling. They created a wonderful narrative that’s interesting and instructive and sheds new light on one of the most significant social movements of the 20th century."

Glisson and David Wharton, assistant professor of Southern Studies and director of documentary projects at the Center, are assisting the students in their efforts, which will include securing grants to fund the project. Helping York and Evans with the project are graduate students Tiffany Hammelin, Evan Hatch, Preston Lauterbach, and Warren Ables.

WARREN ABLES