Passport
You’re invited: Freedom Riders Event
April 6, 2011 Leave a Comment
WPT viewers can watch the powerful new documentary, Freedom Riders: American Experience on television in May. But, an exciting opportunity to preview the film and hear from producers and civil rights experts is coming to Madison next week.
Attend the free public Freedom Riders preview and discussion event with American Experience Executive Producer and UW-Madison Alumnus Mark Samels.
6:30-8:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 12
UW-Madison Microbial Sciences Building
1550 Linden Dr., Madison
Three other experts and civil rights leaders will join Samels on the discussion panel. UW-Madison Associate Professor of History Will Jones, whose work focuses on race, class and work, UW-Madison Alumnus Christopher Hexter who participated in Freedom Summer, a campaign launched in June of 1964 to attempt to register as many African American voters as possible in Mississippi, which until that time had excluded black voters. Vel Phillips was Milwaukee’s first woman alder and first African American alder. She participated in nonviolent protests against discrimination in housing, education and employment during the 1960s.
Free parking for the event is located in lot 36 behind Steenbock Library.
Registration is requested at uwalumni.com/uwforyou.
Freedom Riders tells the powerful and inspirational story of six months in 1961 when more than 400 black and white Americans risked their lives — many endured savage beatings and imprisonment — for traveling together on buses and trains as they journeyed through the Deep South. Watch a preview of the film below.
[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSCY2a3du-M]
The event is a collaboration of Wisconsin Public Television, Wisconsin Public Radio, Wisconsin Alumni Association’s UW for You and UW-Madison Department of Afro-American Studies.
