The St. Augustine Worship Group and members of The United Church before their bus tour of civil rights sites in St. Augustine. This is part of their commemoration of the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964.
On Saturday, February 24, the St. Augustine Friends Worship Group joined with friends from The United Church UCC-DOC for a bus tour of the places in St. Augustine where some of the most important moments in the Civil Rights fight in 1964 took place. Where the children’s march happened and where the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., stayed; where Andrew Young was beaten repeatedly and the site of the Monson Motor Lodge, where so many events in that consequential year unfolded. That year, because of the courageous acts of Black St. Augustinians, including many children, and because the news media sent photos and film footage around the country showing the violence of white St. Augustinians attempting to shore up segregation, then-President Lyndon Johnson cut off the longest filibuster in U.S. history by signing the Civil Rights Act into law, ending legally enforced segregation and racial discrimination. Black St. Augustinians made it happen.
This bus trip, with local Civil Rights historian David Nolan, is part of a year-long initiative developed by the St. Augustine Worship Group and The United Church UCC-DOC honoring the St. Augustinians who put their lives on the line to ensure the passage of the Civil Rights Act 60 years ago.