Marching for Freedom: Walk Together Children and Don’t You Grow Weary, by Elizabeth Partridge, focuses on the role of young people sixty years ago in the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches advocating for the right to vote for all African-American citizens.
It was a difficult time in Selma and throughout the South. Jim Crow laws stood in the way of many people’s civil rights. In 1963, ten-year-old Joanne Blackmon accompanied her grandmother, who intended to register to vote, to the county courthouse. They were denied admittance because of their race and subsequently arrested, the first of numerous times over the following two years. The extraordinary bravery of Blackmon and other young people inspired adults in the community to join in nonviolent protest for civil rights. Participants had to believe they could make a difference. Indeed, their determination, combined with the energy of others, created long-lasting ripples of change for the cause of civil rights in America.
Protests crystallized in the spring of 1965. The constancy of the community in protesting, the brutal events at the Edmund Pettus Bridge, and the participation of Martin Luther King Jr., John Lewis and thousands of others led to President Lyndon Johnson signing the Voting Rights Act into law on August 6, 1965.
Elizabeth Partridge, the author of numerous excellent nonfiction books for young people, combines documentary photos and electrifying essays bringing mature readers directly into this landmark time in history.
Ages 10-15. Viking Books for Young Readers / Penguin Random House, 2009.
The National Park Service maintains a Selma to Montgomery National Historic Trail.
Information from the National Archives about John Lewis, Bloody Sunday, and the Selma to Montgomery marches.