On May 4, 1961, 13 people'seven black and six white'departed by bus from Washington, D.C., en route to New Orleans to test desegregation laws. Known as freedom riders, they were soon faced with dramatic responses'they were attacked by racist mobs in the Deep South.
This summer, 40 years later, UW-Madison African American history Professor Timothy Tyson took about 40 UW-Madison students and faculty on a 'freedom ride' of their own, exploring the meaning of the Civil Rights Movement through historical sites in the South.
Participants presented their travels Tuesday in an open forum attended by more than 50 students, professors and community members. One of their first stops was in Chicago, where students met with Diane Nash, a leader of the freedom rides in 1961 and a key player in the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
'To us she basically embodied the idea of nonviolence [that she started in Nashville in the early 1950s],' said Heather Guenther, a UW-Madison student who participated on the trip, which lasted from June 1 to June 12.
Soon after, they met with Isaac Freeman of the Fairfield Four.
'We were just in our glory,' said Joe Fronczak, a UW-Madison student and participant. 'We got to sing with the best bass singer in the world.'
But it was a much deeper experience than that, he said. The music 'grabbed at you.'
'That's what this trip was all about,' he said. 'It was about the spirit reaching out and grabbing at you.'
For Michelle Gordon, another UW-Madison student and participant, Birmingham, Ala., was one of the highlights of the trip. With family in Birmingham, she found the experience not only personally moving, but one that she could not have found anywhere else.
Attending a church service by the Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, a figure of the Civil Rights Movement, Gordon said she understood what it meant to be a part of the movement.
'This was part of the spiritual feeling you can't read in textbooks ... the fact that these people needed to know that God was on their side and that he would help [them],' she said.
Since the students participating on the summer trip each came from different backgrounds, the group was forced to confront issues of race, history and culture, said Tyina Steptoe, another student on the trip.
'Getting into issues of white guilt ... forced everyone to confront issues that we read about,' said Genella Taylor, another UW-Madison student and participant. 'We were literally on top of each other every day. [We had to] lean into the uncomfortable.'
Selma, Ala., and Clarksdale, Miss., proved to be places where differences among the group were more obvious since these cities were more segregated themselves, participants said. But it was from this kind of atmosphere that they learned the most.
'[This was] the most compelling educational experience that many of us have ever had,' Tyson said.
In order to share their experiences, students and faculty members started an organization called Teaching Racial Understanding Through History.
'We can't just sit back and complain about what's wrong and expect it to change,' Gordon said. 'We need to be active in making that change.'
