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Albany Movement

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@ New Georgia Encyclopedia

Formwalt, Lee W

Description

Encyclopedia article about the civil rights organization based in Albany, Georgia. According to traditional accounts the Albany Movement began in fall 1961 and ended in summer 1962. It was the first mass movement in the modern civil rights era to have as its goal the desegregation of an entire community, and it resulted in the jailing of more than 1,000 African Americans in Albany and surrounding rural counties. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Ralph Abernathy came to Albany with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and were some of the demonstrators arrested. When told as a chapter in the history of the national civil rights movement, Albany was important because of King's involvement and because of the lessons he learned that he would soon apply in Birmingham, Alabama. It may also be viewed as a local movement with deep roots which creates a very different picture of the freedom struggle in the southwest corner of the state.The Civil Rights Digital Library received support from a National Leadership Grant for Libraries awarded to the University of Georgia by the Institute of Museum and Library Services for the aggregation and enhancement of partner metadata.

Record Contributed By

New Georgia Encyclopedia

Record Harvested From

Digital Library of Georgia