An activist who inspired education.
Remembering Ella Baker - Dec. 13, 1903 - Dec. 13, 1986
Zinn Education Project - Teaching a People's History
December 13, 2012
http://zinnedproject.org/posts/14707
In memory, Ella Baker (Dec. 13, 1903 - Dec. 13, 1986),
one of the most important yet least known civil rights
and human rights activists. Her work began in the
1930s and spanned five decades. She was instrumental
in the launch of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating
Committee (SNCC).
http://zinnedproject.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-
content/uploads/2011/12/EllaBaker.jpg
This is rare photo of her at a microphone, since as
she said, "You didn't see me on television, you didn't
see news stories about me. The kind of role that I
tried to play was to pick up pieces or put together
pieces out of which I hoped organization might come.
My theory is, strong people don't need strong
leaders." Photo: AP, 1/3/68
Ella Josephine Baker (Dec. 13, 1903 - Dec. 13, 1986) developed
a sense for social justice early in her life. As a girl
growing up in North Carolina, Baker listened to her
grandmother tell stories about slave revolts. As a slave, her
grandmother had been whipped for refusing to marry a man
chosen for her by the slave owner.
Baker studied at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina.
As a student she challenged school policies that she thought
were unfair. After graduating in 1927 as class valedictorian,
she moved to New York City and began joining social activist
organizations. In 1930, she joined the Young Negroes
Cooperative League, whose purpose was to develop black
economic power through collective planning. She also involved
herself with several women's organizations. She was committed
to economic justice for all people and once said, "People
cannot be free until there is enough work in this land to give
everybody a job."
Ella Baker began her involvement with the NAACP in 1940. She
worked as a field secretary and then served as director of
branches from 1943 until 1946. Inspired by the historic bus
boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1955, Baker co-founded the
organization In Friendship to raise money to fight against Jim
Crow Laws in the deep South. In 1957, Baker moved to Atlanta
to help organize Martin Luther King's new organization, the
Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). She also ran
a voter registration campaign called the Crusade for
Citizenship.
On February 1, 1960, a group of black college students from
North Carolina A&T University refused to leave a Woolworth's
lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina where they had
been denied service. Baker left the SCLC after the Greensboro
sit-ins. She wanted to assist the new student activists
because she viewed young, emerging activists as a resource and
an asset to the movement. Miss Baker organized a meeting at
Shaw University for the student leaders of the sit-ins in
April 1960. From that meeting, the Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee - SNCC - was born.
http://zinnedproject.org/posts/tag/sncc
Adopting the Gandhian theory of nonviolent direct action, SNCC
members joined with activists from the Congress of Racial
Equality (CORE) to organize in the 1961 Freedom Rides. In 1964
SNCC helped create Freedom Summer, an effort to focus national
attention on Mississippi's racism and to register black
voters. Miss Baker, and many of her contemporaries, believed
that voting was one key to freedom.
With Ella Baker's guidance and encouragement, SNCC became one
of the foremost advocates for human rights in the country.
Her influence was reflected in the nickname she acquired:
"Fundi," a Swahili word meaning a person who teaches a craft
to the next generation. Baker continued to be a respected and
influential leader in the fight for human and civil rights
until her death on her 83rd birthday.
Related Resources
Interview: Southern Oral History Program Collection Ella Baker
interviewed by Sue Thrasher and Casey Hayden. April 19. 1977.
http://docsouth.unc.edu/sohp/G-0008/menu.html
Ella's Song by Bernice Johnson Reagon (Sweet Honey in the
Rock.) Lyrics. Audio: scroll down to #8.
http://www.bernicejohnsonreagon.com/ella.shtml
Unsung Heroes: Encouraging Students to Appreciate Those Who
Fought for Social Justice. Essay by Howard Zinn and lesson by
Bill Bigelow. Students research and share stories about unsung
heroes in U.S. history, including Ella Jo Baker.
http://zinnedproject.org/posts/1503
Women's Work: An Untold Story of the Civil Rights Movement. A
lesson to introduce students to many unsung heroes of the
Civil Rights Movement and related movements. Ella Baker is one
of 36 women featured in the lesson.
http://www.civilrightsteaching.org/resources/womenswork
Ella Baker and the Black Freedom Movement A Radical Democratic
Vision by Barbara Ransby (UNC Press, 2005). In this deeply
researched biography, Barbara Ransby chronicles Baker's long
and rich political career as an organizer, an intellectual,
and a teacher, from her early experiences in depression-era
Harlem to the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s.
Ransby shows Baker to be a complex figure whose radical,
democratic worldview, commitment to empowering the black poor,
and emphasis on group-centered, grassroots leadership set her
apart from most of her political contemporaries. Beyond
documenting an extraordinary life, the book paints a vivid
picture of the African American fight for justice and its
intersections with other progressive struggles worldwide
across the twentieth century. [Publisher's description.]
http://bbpbooks.teachingforchange.org/book/9780807856161
Introduction to the book.
http://uncpress.unc.edu/browse/page/688
More books, lessons, and films regarding Mrs. Ella Baker on
the Zinn Education Project website.
http://zinnedproject.org/posts/tag/Ella-Baker
More books and other resources about SNCC on the Zinn
Education Project website.
http://zinnedproject.org/posts/tag/sncc
Poster image of Mrs. Ella Josephine Baker by Robert Shetterly.
From Americans Who Tell the Truth.
http://www.americanswhotellthetruth.org/portraits/ella-baker
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