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The 1963 March on Washington, D.C. took place historically in various stages. It was decades in the making. It took place on August 28, 1963, and the title of the march was "The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom." It was the dream of A. Philip Randolph, who was the President of the Negro American Labor Council and vice President of the AFL-CIO. Randolph was the President of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters (or a powerful labor union involving black Americans porters in trains across America). He wanted a civil rights march in 1941 (with about 100,000 black workers) with Bayard Rustin. It was planned for July 1, 1941. Yet, it didn't happen after President Franklin Delano Roosevelt wrote Executive Order 8802. This forced equal opportunity in the defense industry, which meant that all workers had to be treated the same, no matter what their race was. It was the first major federal civil rights policy since the days of Reconstruction in America. Randolph allowed this to happened after telling FDR that he will make a march in Washington, D.C. if he didn't ban discrimination in the defense industry. African Americans were free from legalized slavery by the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution. Yet, black Americans were still not free from Jim Crow apartheid, rape, lynching, voting rights suppression, economic oppression, racism, sexism, and other evils (that were permitted by the government, private racists, and the structures of society in general). Many people forget that Jim Crow apartheid was legal which means that it was unjust law. By the 19th and 20th centuries, many African Americans grew organizations and institutions that were dedicate to fight for social change. 

After 1941, Randolph and Rustin organized to promote a March on Washington. Their Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom, held at the Lincoln Memorial on May 17, 1957, featured key leaders including Adam Clayton Powell, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and Roy Wilkins. Mahalia Jackson performed at the location. By 1963, the Civil Rights Movement has grown into a new level. Civil rights activists used demonstrations, boycotts, nonviolent direct action across the United States of America. 1963 was the 100th year anniversary of the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation by President Abraham Lincoln. This was a new time. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) put aside their differences and united to promote the march. Black people, white people, Latino people, Asian people, and people of every background came together to promote change the 1963 March in Washington. 1963 saw violent confrontations all over the South in places like: in Cambridge, Maryland; Pine Bluff, Arkansas; Goldsboro, North Carolina; Somerville, Tennessee; Saint Augustine, Florida; and across Mississippi. In most cases, white people attacked nonviolent demonstrators seeking civil rights. Many people wanted the March on Washington to have civil disobedience, some wanted just a protest, and others wanted a complete shutdown of the city. Many activists didn't want tokenism. Dr. King regularly criticized the Kennedy administration for not going far enough on civil rights before 1963. We know Malcolm X criticized the Kennedy administration. The truth is that the Kennedy administration was light years more progressive on civil rights than previous administrations, but it still had a lot of work to do on civil rights issues. 

On May 24, 1963, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy invited African-American novelist James Baldwin, along with a large group of cultural leaders, to a meeting in New York to discuss race relations. Lorraine Hansberry was at the meeting this. This event was one of the most unknown, unsung events of the Civil Rights Movement. James Baldwin, Lorraine Hansberry, and other civil rights activists wanted Kennedy to have a true understanding of the depth of racism in society. The Kennedy administration wanted primarily the law and the court system to eliminate racism in society. James Baldwin, Lorraine Hansberry, and other leaders instead wanted both the courts (and the law) along with active, direct social activism (even self-defense, not just non-violence) to eliminate racism in society. I agree with James Baldwin, Lorraine Hansberry, and other civil rights leaders in that meeting. This disagreement caused a debate in the meeting. It showed the divide between Black America and the Washington political leaders. The murder of Medgar Evers changed everything along with the Birmingham rights Movement. The callous murder of Medgar Evers (in front of his home when Evers was a father and a man who risked his life for black freedom) inspired the Kennedy administration to take things into the next level. The Baldwin Kennedy meeting also pushed the Kennedy administration too. On June 11, 1963, President Kennedy gave a notable civil rights address on national television and radio, announcing that he would begin to push for civil rights legislation. That night (early morning of June 12, 1963), Mississippi activist Medgar Evers was murdered in his own driveway, further escalating national tension around the issue of racial inequality. After Kennedy's assassination, his proposal was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson as the Civil Rights Act of 1964. 

The officially planning and organization of the 1963 March on Washington started by December 1961 by A. Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin. They wanted 2 days of protests and sit ins plus lobbying. They wanted a mass rally at the Lincoln Memorial. Both men wanted to focus on joblessness and to have a public works program to employ black people. As early as the early 1960's, economists predicted an increase of automation and deindustrialization (with the rise of the economies of West Germany and Japan), so a radical economic policy was necessary to build up the economic futures of black Americans. They received help from Stanley Aronowitz of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers; he gathered support from radical organizers who could be trusted not to report their plans to the Kennedy administration. The unionists offered tentative support for a march that would be focused on jobs By May 15, 1963, Randolph said that he wanted an October Emancipation March on Washington for Jobs. The NAACP and the Urban League didn't support the march yet. Randolph won support from union leaders like the UAW's Walter Reuther, but not of AFL–CIO president George Meany. Randolph and Rustin intended to focus the March on economic inequality, stating in their original plan that "integration in the fields of education, housing, transportation and public accommodations will be of limited extent and duration so long as fundamental economic inequality along racial lines persists." As they negotiated with other leaders, they expanded their stated objectives to "Jobs and Freedom", to acknowledge the agenda of groups that focused more on civil rights. 

By June of 1963, leaders from many organizations joined forces to establish the Council for Untied Civil Rights Leadership. This group coordinated funds and the message. Its leaders were called the Big Six. It included Randolph, chosen as titular head of the march; James Farmer, president of the Congress of Racial Equality; John Lewis, chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee; Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference; Roy Wilkins, president of the NAACP; and Whitney Young, president of the National Urban League. King in particular had become well known for his role in the Birmingham campaign and for his Letter from Birmingham Jail. Wilkins and Young initially objected to Rustin as a leader for the march, worried that he would attract the wrong attention because he was a homosexual, a former Communist, and a draft resister. The irony is that Rustin would late be adamantly anti-Communist and even said that Dr. King went too far in his opposition to the unjust Vietnam War. They eventually accepted Bayard Rustin as deputy organizer, on the condition that Randolph act as lead organizer and manage any political fallout. About two months before the march, the Big Six broadened their organizing coalition by bringing on board four white men who supported their efforts: Walter Reuther, president of the United Automobile Workers; Eugene Carson Blake, former president of the National Council of Churches; Mathew Ahmann, executive director of the National Catholic Conference for Interracial Justice; and Joachim Prinz, president of the American Jewish Congress. Together, the Big Six plus four became known as the "Big Ten." John Lewis later recalled, "Somehow, some way, we worked well together. The six of us, plus the four. We became like brothers."

President Kennedy feared at first that such a march would provoke violence and chaos on June 22, 1963. The civil rights leaders wanted the march. Wilkins wanted people to rule out civil disobedience as a compromised. Dr. King and Whitney Young agreed with this policy. Leaders of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), who wanted to conduct direct actions against the Department of Justice, endorsed the protest before they were informed that civil disobedience would not be allowed. Finalized plans for the March were announced in a press conference on July 2. It is no secret that SNCC and the SCLC disagreed on the tactics of finding justice but not on the overall goal. Bayard Rustin was an expert organizer, so he mobilized and used logistics to make the march a success. Rustin was a civil rights veteran and organizer of the 1947 Journey of Reconciliation, the first of the Freedom Rides to test the Supreme Court ruling that banned racial discrimination in interstate travel. Rustin was a long-time associate of both Randolph and Dr. King. With Randolph concentrating on building the march's political coalition, Rustin built and led the team of two hundred activists and organizers who publicized the march and recruited the marchers, coordinated the buses and trains, provided the marshals, and set up and administered all of the logistic details of a mass march in the nation's capital. During the days leading up to the march, these 200 volunteers used the ballroom of Washington DC radio station WUST as their operations headquarters. Even some civil rights activists were worried about violence with the march. Malcolm X condemned the march as the "farce on Washington." Malcolm X (then a member of the Nation of Islam) felt that the march was a liberal establishment puppet show used to water down the progress of black revolutionary change. Some organizers disagreed about the purpose or reason of the march. 

The NAACP and Urban League saw it as a gesture of support for the civil rights bill that had been introduced by the Kennedy Administration. Randolph, King, and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) believed it could raise both civil rights and economic issues to national attention beyond the Kennedy bill. CORE and SNCC believed the march could challenge and condemn the Kennedy administration's inaction and lack of support for civil rights for African Americans. The organizations did ultimate unite for civil rights legislation, ending school segregation, have a public works programs, a federal law banning public and private discrimination, a higher minimum wage, enforce the 14th Amendment, expand the Fair Labor Standards Act, and allow the Attorney General to have injunctive suits when constitutional rights of citizens were violated. Although in years past, Randolph had supported "black only" marches, partly to reduce the impression that the civil rights movement was dominated by white communists, organizers in 1963 agreed that white and black people marching side by side would create a more powerful image. The Kennedy administration worked with the organizers in planning the March. Chicago and New York City (as well as some corporations) agreed to designate August 28 as "Freedom Day" and give workers the day off. Some far right people including Hoover claimed that the March was Communist inspired (which is a lie). Even FBI agent William C. Sullivan had a large report on August 23 saying that Communists failed to infiltrate the civil rights movement. Far right hypocrite Strom Thurmond (who committed adultery, supported segregation, and had a biracial child) attacked the March as Communist. Organizers worked hard at a building at West 130th St. and Lenox in Harlem, NYC. Activists sold buttons to promote the march. The button featured two hands shakings with the words of "March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom", a union bug, and the date August 28, 1963. By August 2, they had distributed 42,000 of the buttons. Their goal was a crowd of at least 100,000 people. As the march was being planned, activists across the country received bomb threats at their homes and in their offices. The Los Angeles Times received a message saying its headquarters would be bombed unless it printed a message calling the president a "N_____ Lover". Five airplanes were grounded on the morning of August 28 due to bomb threats. A man in Kansas City telephoned the FBI to say he would put a hole between King's eyes; the FBI did not respond. Roy Wilkins was threatened with assassination if he did not leave the country. Previously, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had a march in Detroit (called the Walk for Freedom on June 23, 1963) where he gave a similar Dream speech about racial justice and economic justice. 

By August 28, 1963, thousands of human beings came to Washington, D.C. on Wednesday. They traveled by road, rail, and air. Marchers from Boston traveled overnight and arrived in Washington at 7am after an eight-hour trip, but others took much longer bus rides from cities such as Milwaukee, Little Rock, and St. Louis. Organizers persuaded New York's MTA to run extra subway trains after midnight on August 28, and the New York City bus terminal was busy throughout the night with peak crowds. A total of 450 buses left New York City from Harlem. Maryland police reported that "by 8:00 a.m., 100 buses an hour were streaming through the Baltimore Harbor Tunnel." The United Automobile Workers financed bus transportation for 5,000 of its rank-and-file members, providing the largest single contingent from any organization. One reporter, Fred Powledge, accompanied African Americans who boarded six buses in Birmingham, Alabama, for the 750-mile trip to Washington. The people in the march prayed that violence wouldn't exist. It was unprecedented during that time. Some participants who arrived early held an all-night vigil outside the Department of Justice, claiming it had unfairly targeted civil rights activists and that it had been too lenient on white supremacists who attacked them. Some people waited long hours. The federal government used D.C. police, 2,000 men from the National Guard, and other soldiers to protect the marchers. The Pentagon had 19,000 troops in the suburbs. This Operation Steep Hill plan was enacted. Liquor sales were banned in Washington, D.C. Hospitals stockpiled blood plasma and cancelled elective surgeries. Many games were cancelled. The sound system was formed. On August 28, more than 2,000 buses, 21 chartered trains, 10 chartered airliners, and uncounted cars converged on Washington.

Marchers were not supposed to create their own signs, though this rule was not completely enforced by marshals. Most of the demonstrators did carry pre-made signs, available in piles at the Washington Monument. The UAW provided thousands of signs that, among other things, read: "There Is No Halfway House on the Road to Freedom," "Equal Rights and Jobs NOW," "UAW Supports Freedom March," "in Freedom we are Born, in Freedom we must Live," and "Before we'll be a Slave, we'll be Buried in our Grave."

About 50 members of the American Nazi Party staged a counter-protest and were quickly dispersed by police. The rest of Washington was quiet during the March. Most non-participating workers stayed home. Jailers allowed inmates to watch the March on TV. Representatives from sponsoring organizations addressed the crowd from the podium at the Lincoln Memorial. Those speakers were from the Big Ten (that included the Big Six too), religious leaders (Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish leaders), and labor leader Walter Reuther. None of the official speeches was by a woman. Dancer and actress Josephine Baker gave a speech during the preliminary offerings, but women were limited in the official program to a "tribute" led by Bayard Rustin, at which Daisy Bates also spoke briefly. Unfortunately, sexism existed in the civil rights movement. Floyd McKissick read James Farmer's speech because Farmer had been arrested during a protest in Louisiana; Farmer wrote that the protests would not stop "until the dogs stop biting us in the South and the rats stop biting us in the North." There were 10 major speakers at the March on Washington in 1963. 

  

  

The Birmingham Movement in Alabama was one of the most important events of the American Civil Rights Movement. It was started in early 1963. The Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and SNCC were heavily involved. The goal of the movement was to end Jim Crow apartheid in the most segregated city of America (in that time period) which was Birmingham, Alabama. It was a victory, but it has costs. The costs of babies and kids were arrested, beat by dogs, and sprayed with water hoses form the local government are tragic images that I will never forget form my mind. Some of the cruelest form of racism against black history in all of human history was on display in Birmingham back in 1963. The racism was so evil, that in Birmingham (before Watts in 1965), there was a rebellion of black people using self-defense against racists after the campaign was over. Dr. King, Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, Wyatt Tee Walker, Dorothy, Cotton, and other people worked together to fight injustice in Birmingham. Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth of the ACMHR organized a boycott to pressure business leaders to open employment to people of all races, and end segregation in public facilities, restaurants, schools, and stores. When local business and governmental leaders resisted the boycott, the SCLC agreed to assist. Organizer Wyatt Tee Walker joined Birmingham activist Shuttlesworth and began what they called Project C, a series of sit-ins and marches intended to provoke mass arrests. Later, kids were used by the activists to protest discrimination and oppression. Eugene "Bull" Connor was the racist who used high pressure water hoses and police attack dogs on children and adult bystanders. The movement led to ending racial segregation in the South, desegregation of Birmingham, and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to be passed. The twin movements in Birmingham and later in Selma (by 1965) help to end legalized Jim Crow apartheid in American society. The people led the change in a grassroots level. 

 

Thirty years after the Waco siege represented a new era of our time. I was in elementary school when the situation happened in early 1993. The reality was that it came after the Cold War ended. The government saw new changes from the growth of new cults from the Branch Davidians to Heaven's Gate. These cults were based on total fear of the federal government or espousing extremist views. There should be a government that have boundaries in how they conduct themselves, but the federal government shouldn't be eliminated altogether from society. The federal government shouldn't act corrupt, but the federal government has a role to provide for the general welfare of the people. The standoff lasted from February 28 to April 19, 1993. It ended with many people being killed by flames. The ATF attempted to serve a search and arrest warrant for illegal weapons. The fire killed 86 total people. The cult leader David Koresh was no hero. He was a false prophet, a blasphemer (in claiming that he was Jesus Christ), and an abuser (he abused kids and women with his deceptions). So, David Koresh cowardly caused his own death and the deaths of other people. There is no doubt that the government made mistakes in the siege, even the mainstream media admitted to this. Yet, David Koresh was on a suicide mission by being involved in starting the fire murdering innocent people. This tragedy has help grown the militia movement. Tim McVeigh used this tragedy as his sick motive to enact the OKC Bombing in April of 1995 (when I was in the 6th grade of middle school). Therefore, we have to show the truth about these melancholy circumstances. 

 

Wisdom comes about daily. This following information is what I found out about my distant cousins in late March of 2023. To start, my ancestor who was Nanny Woodson had a child with Mike Bozeman named Winny Woodson.  Nanny Woodson passed away in ca. 1805. Her children lived in a place in Southampton County, Virginia. Her children lived in 95 acres of cleared land. Winny Woodson married a black American freeman named Burwell Williams. Burwell Williams and Winny Woodson owned a lot of farmland in Virginia. One of their children were John Burwell Williams. John Burwell Williams married a woman named Mary. The couple had many children (who were James Williams, Elizabeth Williams, John Williams, Romine Williams, Anna Williams, Susan Williams, George Williams, Nicholas Williams, and Lucy Williams), and one of them was Mary L. Williams (and I saw a picture of her or my late 1st cousin). Mary L. Williams had many children with Eddie Drew Kello. One of their children was Rosa W. Peterson (1887-1966). Rosa W. Peterson was a tall woman, and she married James Edward Peterson (1885-1945). One of their children was Eunice Roberta Peterson (1928-1992). She was born in Courtland, Southampton County, Virginia. She married William Thomas Westbrook Jr. (1929-2002) at Courtland, Virginia on January 3, 1952. Their children and my 4th cousins are: Valerie Leona Westbrook (b. 1958. She worked in the Portsmouth, Virginia Public School system), Byron Eugence Westbrook (b. 1959. He is married to Lona M. Westbrook [b.1957] and their daughter is Tamara Yveeta Westbook [b. 1984]), William Thomas Westbrook III (1961-1997), and Angie Rose Westbrook Gilchrist (b. 1966. She is married to Pervis Gilchrist). 

Another child of Mary L. Williams and Eddie Drew Kello was Corrine Kelle (1891-1967). She married Jimmie Bradshaw (1892-1971) on February 9, 1911, in Virginia. Their children were Mamie Lee Bradshaw (1918-1998), Jamer Bradshaw (b. 1923), Ida Mae Bradshaw (1925-2013), Emma F. Bradshaw (b. 1927), and Hannie May Bradshaw (b. 1937). My 3rd step cousin Mamie Lee Bradshaw (she was adopted) married Jasper Yank Scott (1904-1984) on January 25, 1941, at Southampton, Virginia. They had many children like my 4th step cousin Barbara Lee Soctt (b. 1954), Annie Marie Owens (1958-2017), etc. Annie Marie Owens had a child with Frank James Owens (b. 1948) named Alexis Farren Diamonique Scott (b. 1986). The daughter of Mamie Lee Bradshaw and Jasper Yank was Phyllis Lynettee Juanita Scott (1951-2009), who was born on November 24, 1951 at Southampton County, Virginia. She had the following children with James Willie Banks: Velnesa Paulette Scott Hall (b. 1966), Yolonda Scott, and Alex Scott. 

The late Raheem Ahmad released the picture of the ancestor Mary L. Williams publicly. He passed away at Hampton, Virginia on May 31, 2021. His parents were Emma Bradshaw-Lankford and Sylvester Warren. He has many children whose names are Michelle Humphries of Washington, D.C, Sean Timothy Ahmad of Philadelphia, and Donna Willimas Boykins of Franklin, Virginia. Raheem Ahmad (formerly James Earnet Bradshaw) was born on October 3, 1945, and he was my 4th cousin. Raheem Ahmad married Bettie Jean Best first, Linda Sheryl Moore second, and his last wife was Nadirah Ahmad. Raheem's mother was Emma Frances Bradshaw Lankford (b. 1926). Emma's parents were Jimmie Bradshaw (1892-1971) and Corrine Kelle (1891-1967). Corrine's mother or Raheem Ahmad's great grandmother was Mary L. Williams (who was the daughter of John Burwell Williams). 

 

The music of the 1980's was about experimentation and the usage of new technologies to expand the influence of music globally. The racist backlash against disco caused disco to not be shown in the mainstream that much until the 1990's. Yet, house music was born in Chicago to promote that creative essence of music. Societies in the world were dominated by conservative governments in America, the UK, etc. Laissez faire capitalism and the free market was glorified by many people as the cure to economic problems, but time reveals that not to be the case at all. The AIDS Epidemic was very widespread in the 1980's, and the beginning of the end of the Cold War existed. The Soviet Union was ending because of overextended wars, dictatorships in various Eastern Bloc areas, political instability, a weakened society, and other economic issues. There were progressive actions in that decade like Live Aid, protests to end apartheid, protests to end the existence of more nuclear weapons, and the growth of other social movements. Major wars happened and the birth of Al-Qaeda existed. Musically, the 1980's saw the births of BET and MTV expanding rock, pop, R&B, gospel, hip hop, country, jazz, and other forms of music worldwide. Music videos became more common place. Worldwide, popular acts reached into another level with legends like Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Duran Duran, Prince, Cyndi Lauper, Poison, Def Leppard, Bon Jovi, KISS, Queen, Madonna, etc. Rock genres like metal, new wave, and punk were commonplace. We saw drum machines, synthesizer sounds, and drum reverb flourish in the 1980's. Thriller became the bestselling R&B album of all time. Hip hop music was more in the mainstream by 1989 with Public Enemy, LL Cool J, EPMD, etc. There was new style of rock with U2, REM, etc. that used political and social messages in their music (not just music about love and romance). The Live Aid concert in 1985 helped to give aid to Ethiopia where human beings were suffering from a major famine. The music of the 1980's was about fun, experimentation, growing concepts into another level, and delving into political matters relevant to us as human beings. We are human beings with a complex social culture, and music (utilized in the right way) is one of many ways where we can comprehensively enhance the development of our civilization in general. 

  

By Timothy