Legacies: Three Trailblazers

This tour is designed to give a context to the city in which we live and move around every day. The city of Chicago has a long and rich history. Like all history, it can be examined from many angles and through many lenses. On this occasion, we will limit our focus to the ongoing fight for civil rights on behalf of African American people in Chicago. Though the American Civil Rights movement is generally narrowly defined as having taken place between 1954 and 1968, we will look at events significant to this struggle reaching back to the anti-lynching crusade through the Black Panther Party.

Our tour seeks to give background by highlighting events that occurred here in Chicago. Though these events all had implications and impact far beyond this locale, we are focusing on sites that we might drive past on a daily basis without ever knowing what took place there. Chicago is a diverse city with a complex and layered history— so many stories of the many peoples of Chicago could be highlighted. However, in this tour, we will limit ourselves to this particular slice of history.

Several videos are meant to be watched along the way to give fuller background and history, though honestly, we will just be skimming the surface! There are a variety of sources for these videos and all have been cited so that you can look into these matters further. Here are the sites that will be visited:

1.The Light of Truth: Ida B. Wells National Monument, 3729 S Langley Ave

2. Dr. Martin Luther King’s North Lawndale Home, 2337 W Monroe Street

3. Fred Hampton Pool, 200 S 3rd Ave
Maywood