Med Gar Evers News Today

In disguise when he was doing that investigation. he dressed as a field hand on his trips to collect evidence for that crime. he was known to drive 100 miles an hour to get safely out of town and to try to shake anybody who was following him. thats what it took to be the field secretary for the naacp in mississippi in 1955. he worked for voting rights in mississippi before there was a voting rights act. when registering to vote or trying to vote meant risking your life and it particularly meant ...

Everybody to the way things ought to be. he saw that as possible in the very difficult place where he lived in his very difficult own time. >> now for many of us whove gone overseas and fought for this country, and fought for mississippi, we fought for alabama, we fought for north carolina, we fought for illinois, and we fought for every state in this union. now, were going to stay here and see that the thing that the mayor has said become a reality. [ applause ] >> medgar evers stayed in jim cr...

Of mississippi at ole miss. ole miss was not yet integrated and the school turned him down on the basis of his race. he then became the first field secretary in his state for the naacp and at that time that was a job that was not some kind of metaphor for bravery, it was the soul of bravery. right at the outset of mr. evers work in mississippi a 14-year-old boy was kidnapped off the porch of a store in a town called money, mississippi. he was taken in retaliation for him whistling or flirting or...

Of the great migration came from a whole range of socioeconomic backgrounds. but as it got on toward the 1950s, as we were several decades into that migration, the people who by then were leaving tended to be those who were at the higher end of the spectrum. tended to be those who had the benefit of education. who had the means to seek out and have a hope of getting new jobs in new states that they were going to move to. an education offered a way out, and a lot of americans who had that, who we...

Medgar evers decided mississippi was worth staying in when people were leaving. stay in and dying in. it was harder for his family to accept his decision after what happened to him. after his death, they left mississippi, joined the great migration in a sense and stayed away from the state for a long, long time. last year medgar evers widow returned to jackson after decades away. she returned to jackson not just for a visit, but to live and to run the medgar and myrlie evers institute in jackson...

>>reporter: thats right. outside the larger program you had several elected officials or former elected officials speaking. you also saw the widow who delivered remarks. it was indoors, the president spent his time inside and spent about 40 minutes touring the museum, saw an exhibit on the freedom rider, he also saw an exhibit on med gar evers, who was assassinated in 1963. he spoke for about 10 minutes to civil rights veterans and museum patrons and elected officials. then he headed back to flo...