More than 46 years ago, civil rights activist Stokely Carmichael, fresh from a stint in Greenwood’s jail, uttered the words “black power” at Broad Street Park.
On Monday, a ceremony unveiling a Mississippi Freedom Trail marker was held at the Greenwood Community and Recreation Center on Elm Street because of the possibility of bad weather. The marker will be permanently placed in Broad Street Park.
Carmichael, chairman of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, had come to Greenwood as part of the continuation of the “March Against Fear,” which was started by James Meredith on June 5, 1966.
When Meredith, the first black admitted to the University of Mississippi, was shot by a sniper shortly after starting out, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Carmichael and other vowed to continue the march to Jackson.
Charles McLaurin, who served as a field secretary for SNCC at the time of the march, attended the unveiling Monday.
“While this marker honors Stokely, it also honors all the Greenwood people who took part in the movement,” said McLaurin, 73, who lives in Indianola.
McLaurin said he held the microphone as Carmichael delivered his famous speech at Broad Street Park.
Once the marchers reached Grenada, he said, the leaders felt it was symbolically important to bring it through the Delta.
“We had been in Greenwood earlier,” helping to register blacks to vote, McLaurin said.
The group first attempted to encamp for the night at Mississippi Valley State University. McLaurin said they met with James Herbert White, then president of MVSU, at his residence one evening.
“He was there. He was flanked by about 10 state troopers,” McLaurin said. “He denied us the use of the campus.”
When Carmichael returned to Greenwood, he was told by police that he couldn’t put up a tent in Stone Street Park. He put one up anyway and was arrested, McLaurin said.
McLaurin said the marchers were heading into Greenwood, and it was decided to have them show up at Broad Street Park without seeking approval in advance from the police.
“Stokely dared them to throw us out,” he said.
On June 16, 1966, Carmichael was released from police custody and was angry over the way he had been treated, McLaurin said.
“He said, ‘We don’t have no clout. We need some black power,’” McLaurin said.
Later, Carmichael would say that black power “is a call for black people in this country to unite, to recognize their heritage, to build a sense of community. It is a call for black people to define their own goals, to lead their own organizations.
“If we had said ‘Negro power,’ nobody would get scared,” Carmichael said, “‘... but it is the word ‘black’ ... that bothers people.’”
McLaurin said political power — through the ballot box — was the first phase of black power. That also had also been championed by Medgar Evers, the state NAACP leader prior to his assassination in 1963. Although blacks now have political power, they still lack economic power, he said.
State Rep. Willie Perkins, D-Greenwood, said he personally knew Carmichael, who had changed his name to Kwame Ture in 1969. Ture spoke at Valley in 1984, and Perkins said he put him up at his house for the night.
Perkins said Carmichael’s name change was in homage to Kwame Nkrumah, the then exiled president of Ghana, and Ahmed Sékou Touré, prime minister of Guinea.
Perkins said Carmichael’s “black power” message was intended to motivate blacks to be proud, become unified and establish political power nationwide.
State Sen. David Jordan, D-Greenwood, said the marker serves as an important reminder of how far blacks have come in the Delta.
“Greenwood was a hell spot. Black people couldn’t even vote,” he said.
At one point, only 40 blacks were registered to vote in majority-black Leflore County, Jordan said.
“We have one more river to cross,” he said. “We’re not finished, but we’re in much better shape than we were then.”
Leflore County Supervisor Robert Moore said it was an honor to be at the unveiling.
“We have come a long way, and we have a long way to go,” he said. “It is said that power concedes nothing without a struggle. Blacks have been involved with the struggle — the struggle between white power on one end and black power on the other end with politics in the middle.”
Still, the black power marker serves as an important reminder, McLaurin said.
“That marker is a witness to the fact that this state recognizes that ‘black power’ speech,” he said.
• Contact Bob Darden at 581-7239 or bdarden@gwcommonwealth.com.
