An artifact spotlighting a trailblazer in the Civil Rights movement will soon be displayed at the Two Mississippi Museums in Jackson.
The family of Fannie Lou Hamer has donated the civil rights leader’s Presidential Medal of Freedom to the Mississippi Department of Archives and History, aiming to ensure her legacy of activism is shared with future generations. The museums, the Museum of Mississippi History and the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum, recently commemorated Hamer’s 108th birth date on Oct. 6.
“We are incredibly thankful to the family of Fannie Lou Hamer for donating this medal to the people of Mississippi,” Michael Morris, director of the Two Mississippi Museums, said. “The medal demonstrates the national significance of Hamer and commemorates her enduring legacy.”
Hamer was posthumously awarded by former President Joe Biden with the nation’s highest civilian honor before exiting office in January. Biden described Hamer as “one of the most powerful voices of the Civil Rights Movement,” as she fought for voting rights – enduring beatings and arrests – in pursuit of Black Americans’ constitutional right to vote.
“We feel this is an honor that should be shared with everyone,” Monica Land, Hamer’s niece and producer of the award-winning film, “Fannie Lou Hamer’s America,” said. “Our hope is that others will see it and want to learn more about Aunt Fannie Lou, her life, her legacy, and the tremendous sacrifices she made on behalf of others.”
Hamer was born Fannie Lou Townsend in 1917 in rural Mississippi into a family of sharecroppers, and she grew up working on a plantation. After she attended a meeting held by members of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1962, she eventually became an organizer.
In 1963, Hamer and several others were severely beaten by local law enforcement after they returned from a voter registration workshop in South Carolina. The assault left Hamer with lifelong injuries.
Hamer was co-founder of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, which attempted to seat an interracial delegation at the 1964 Democratic National Convention. In her testimony before the credentials committee, she described the opposition and threats she and other Black people faced for attempting to vote, before declaring: “I question America.”
That testimony and the activities of Freedom Summer 1964, which she also helped organize, were among the factors leading to the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. And, years later, Hamer was a member of the first integrated Mississippi state delegation at the Democratic National Convention in 1968.
“Her activism was fueled by her own experiences with racial oppression and injustice,” Land said.
Hamer died in 1977 at the age of 59. Morris said curators will determine where the medal will be exhibited in the museum, and the artifact will go on display within the next few months.
“Our museums already trace much of her life’s work,” Morris said. “The medal symbolizes the impact her courageous activism has had on the lives of Black people in Mississippi and across the nation.”
