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                                    Rosa Parks: A Life
                                    by Douglas Brinkley

                                    Picture
                                    CA Standards:



                                    Click HERE to see the NAACP Timeline

                                    “The Mission of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights for all, and to eliminate radical hatred and racial discrimination. The NAACP strives for a society where all individuals are treated fairly and equally.”

                                    "NAACP: Celebrating A Century, 100 Years in Pictures"
                                    The NAACP is built on the collective courage of thousands of people of all races, nationalities and faiths united in one premise - that all men and women are created equal. From the ballot box to the boardroom, the NAACP has led the fight for civil rights and social justice. The NAACP and The Crisis Publishing Company have joined with Gibbs Smith Publisher to bring you a visually stunning and groundbreaking book that captures the 100 years of the NAACP and The Crisis titled
                                    "NAACP: Celebrating A Century, 100 Years in Pictures."

                                    Influence on Music


                                    "Strange Fruit" by Billie Holiday

                                    Southern trees bear a strange fruit,
                                    Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
                                    Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze,
                                    Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.

                                    Pastoral scene of the gallant south,
                                    The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
                                    Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh,
                                    Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.

                                    Here is fruit for the crows to pluck,
                                    For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,
                                    For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop,
                                    Here is a strange and bitter crop.

                                    The Story Behind “Strange Fruit” - YouTube (10 mins)


                                    What are the "strange fruit"?

                                    Picture








                                    The Digital Journalist
                                    "Lynching 1930
                                    A mob of 10,000 whites took sledgehammers to the county jailhouse doors to get at these two young blacks accused of raping a white girl; the girl’s uncle saved the life of a third by proclaiming the man’s innocence. Although this was Marion, Ind., most of the nearly 5,000 lynchings documented between Reconstruction and the late 1960s were perpetrated in the South. (Hangings, beatings and mutilations were called the sentence of “Judge Lynch.”) Some lynching photos were made into postcards designed to boost white supremacy, but the tortured bodies and grotesquely happy crowds ended up revolting as many as they scared. Today the images remind us that we have not come as far from barbarity as we’d like to think.


                                    "Brown Eyed Handsome Man"
                                    by Chuck Berry

                                    Arrested on charges of unemployment
                                    He was sittin in the witness stand
                                    The judge's wife called up the district attorney
                                    To say "free that brown eyed man"
                                    If you want your job you'd better free that brown eyed man.

                                    Flyn' across the desert in the TWA
                                    I saw a woman walking across the sand
                                    She been walkin 30 miles en route to Bombay
                                    To meet a Brown eyed handsome man
                                    Her destination was a Brown eyed handsome man.

                                    Way back in history 3000 years
                                    Back ever since the world began
                                    There's been a whole lotta good women she'd a tear For a brown eyed handsome man
                                    A lot of trouble for a brown eyed handsome man.

                                    Beautiful daughter couldn't make up her mind
                                    'tween a doctor and a lawyer man
                                    The mother told the daughter "go out and find
                                    Yourself a brown eyed handsome man"
                                    That's what your daddy was: a brown eyed handsome man.

                                    Milo Venus was a beautiful lass            
                                    She had the world at the palm of her hand      But she lost both the arms in a wrestling match                     
                                    To get a brown eyed handsome man            
                                    She fought and won herself a brown eyed handsome man.                                                                                                        
                                    Two, three, the count with nobody on
                                    He hit a high fly into the stand
                                    Round the third he was headed for home
                                    He was a brown eyed handsome man.
                                    That won the game. He was a brown eyed handsome man.
                                    Chuck Berry w/ Robert Cray - YouTube (2 mins)