By Taronda E. Spencer
Title: Fannie Lou Hamer papers, 1966-1978
Primary Creator: Hamer, Fannie Lou (1917-1977)
Extent: 16.0 Linear Feet
Arrangement: The materials when accessioned were not in any inherent order. The collection is arranged in topical series with correspondence preceding non-correspondence. Most letters date from 1967-1969. Non-correspondence generally falls in the following order: history or by-laws, financial records, memorandum, minutes, and proposals. Materials specifically relating to Fannie Lou Hamer are grouped under the heading "Personal." Papers dealing with major organizations are listed under the organization's title and include the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, Freedom Farms Corporation, Mississippians United to Elect Negro Candidates, and Delta Opportunities Corporation. Other smaller series are represented in the collection.
Date Acquired: 01/01/1981
Subjects: Freedom Farms Corporation (Sunflower County, Miss.), Hamer, Fannie Lou, Mississippi - Race relations, Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, Mississippi Loyalist Democratic Party, Race relations - History - 20th century, Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (U.S.), Voter registration
Forms of Material: Correspondence, Moving images, Photographs
Languages: English
The Papers of Fannie Lou Hamer measure approximately 16 linear feet and consist of 3,293 pieces of correspondence dated between 1966 and 1978. The correspondence represented includes not only that of Fannie Lou Hamer, but also that of a number of organizations to which she was in some way connected and of her business manager, Joseph Harris. Much of Hamer's business correspondence is included in the Harris correspondence. He was almost entirely responsible for the business aspects of Hamer's career, and in some cases he also represented her interests in organizations to which she belonged.
Also included in the papers are programs, photographs, invitations, newspaper articles, a print of the 16mm documentary film Oh, Freedom! on the civil rights movement, and a variety of material from each of the organizations represented.
This collection was processed under a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Fannie Lou Hamer was a civil rights activist at the height of the Civil Rights Movement in Mississippi. She was a member of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, as well as other organizations that sought to assist the lives of African Americans.
Born on October 6, 1917 in Montgomery County, Mississippi, Hamer was the youngest of twenty children born to Jim and Ella Townsend. The family worked as sharecroppers moving to Sunflower County, Mississippi, in 1919. At the age of nine, Hamer joined the family picking cotton, but was able to start her education in a plantation school at that time.
She married Perry "Pap" Hamer, another sharecropper in 1945, and worked on the Dee Marlow Plantation from 1947-1962. She attended the first mass meeting of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in Ruleville, Mississippi, and then made her first failed attempt to register to vote with eighteen other sharecroppers in Indianola, Mississippi. As a result of this failed attempt, she was fired from her job on the Marlow Plantation and forced from her home. The Hamer's moved to the town of Ruleville, where the William Tucker family took them in until the violence forced them to move again to a neighboring county. In 1963, she passed the Mississippi literacy test and became a registered voter. She began a more active role in the Civil Rights Movement, working to obtain federal commodities for underprivileged black families, and with SNCC as a field secretary organizing voter registration campaigns and welfare programs. Hamer was arrested in Winona, Mississippi, on a return trip from a voter registration workshop and severely beaten while in custody as were three others also arrested. They remained jailed for three days until their release was demanded by James Bevel and Andrew Young.
In 1964, the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) was founded due to lack of acceptance of Blacks into the regular state Democratic Party. Hamer became vice chairperson of MFDP, which sent a delegation to the Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City, New Jersey as a challenge to the seating of the regular Mississippi delegation. During the National Convention, Hamer made a television address to the convention explaining the poverty, unemployment, disfranchisement, intimidation, and violence that existed in Mississippi toward African Americans. The Convention offered a compromise, which was refused by MFDP, to seat two members of the regular delegation and two members of MFDP with no voting power. After the Civil Rights Act of 1965, the National Convention pledged not to seat any delegation in the 1968 Democratic Convention, which discriminated against Blacks in the selection of delegates. Hamer also attempted to run for Congress in 1964 from the Second Mississippi Congressional District against the white incumbent, Jamie Whitten, but was not allowed on the regular ballot. The MFDP conceived the "Freedom Ballot" on which all candidates' names were placed. Jamie Whitten received only 49 votes to 33,009 votes on the "Freedom Ballot." In continuing the fight for the vote, Hamer appealed to Congress, with Victoria Grey and Annie Devine, in a dramatic challenge to the House of Representatives against the seating of the five regular Mississippi representatives. Their challenge was argued on the floor of the House and defeated. These three women were the first African American women to ever sit on the floor of the House.
In 1966, she became a member of the National Committee for Free Elections in Sunflower, Mississippi. Hamer was the plaintiff in a suit charging discrimination for the 1965 election. In June 8, 1967 the municipal elections in Sunflower and Moorhead Counties were overturned by the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals and were the first elections set aside because African Americans were denied the vote. Hamer continued to be active as a member of the Democratic National Committee for Mississippi from 1968 to 1971.
In 1969, Hamer founded the Freedom Farms Corporation (FFC), a nonprofit venture designed to help needy families, both black and white, to raise food and livestock on which to live. The FFC provided social services, minority business opportunities, scholarships, and grants for education. Hamer continued her civic and political activities throughout the seventies and received many awards and honorary degrees for her activism. By 1976, she was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a radical mastectomy. Unfortunately, her fight with cancer was not won and she died in Mound Bayou Hospital on March 14, 1977.
Freedom Farms Corporation (Sunflower County, Miss.)
Hamer, Fannie Lou
Mississippi - Race relations
Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party
Mississippi Loyalist Democratic Party
Race relations - History - 20th century
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (U.S.)
Voter registration
Repository: Amistad Research Center
Access Restrictions: None
Use Restrictions: Any copy rights such as the donor may possess in this property are hereby dedicated to the public. It is the responsibility of an author to secure permission for publication from the holder of the copyright to any material contained in this collection.
Acquisition Source: Hamer Estate
Acquisition Method: Gift
Appraisal Information: This collection documents the activities of one of the most successful leaders of the civil rights movement in Mississippi.
Original/Copies Note: Microfilm copies are available for research use.
Related Materials:
CORE Mississippi, 4th Congregational District records (microfilm)
Fishman, Rose Carver letters, 1965-1968
Freedom Democratic Party records (microfilm)
Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee records (microfilm)
Valien, Preston & Bonita papers
Other Note: Correspondence index attached as PDF.
Other URL: http://www.amistadresearchcenter.org/pdfs/Archon/Hamer, Fannie Lou Papers - Correspondence Index.pdf
Boxes 5-9
The MFDP series documents Hamer's involvement in this organization and contains information about the various FDP chapters throughout the state, especially the Delta area. Materials pertaining to voter registration comprise the majority of records, which consists of registration rosters and volunteer applications for registration workers and block captains. Also included are the various FDP chapter political handbooks and manuals that were distributed to teach citizens of Mississippi about voting rights. Campaign materials for MFDP candidates can also be found within this series. There is relatively little documentation for the MFDP's role in national politics.
