Page 35 – Zinn Education Project

The Sugar Shack | Zinn Education Project

Aug. 6, 1965: Voting Rights Act

The Voting Rights Act was signed into law.

Aug. 6, 1964: Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party Convention

The MFDP held a State Convention with 2,500 people in Jackson, Mississippi.

Aug. 6, 1945: The U.S. Dropped an Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima

The United States dropped an atomic bomb for the first time in war over the Japanese city of Hiroshima.

Aug. 6, 1855: Bloody Monday

On election day, in Louisville, Kentucky, Protestant mobs attacked German and Irish Catholic neighborhoods.

Visitors look at a memorial near the entrance of the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin Wednesday, July 31, 2013, in Oak Creek, Wisconsin

Aug. 5, 2012: The Sikh Temple of Wisconsin Massacre

A white supremacist shot and killed seven members of the Sikh Temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin.

Newspaper account of African Americans killed and wounded during labor strife in Polk County, from the New York Times; August 10, 1896.

Aug. 5, 1896: Polk County Massacre

White workers murdered Black workers in Arkansas who were coming to work on the railways.

photos of the three missing men during Mississippi Freedom Summer.

Aug. 4, 1964: Civil Rights Workers Bodies Found

The bodies of three lynched civil rights workers (James Chaney, Michael Schwerner, and Andrew Goodman) were found in Neshoba County, Mississippi.

Aug. 3, 1981: Air Traffic Controllers Strike

The Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO) declared a strike.

Aug. 3, 1980: Reagan Gives “State’s Rights” Speech at Neshoba County Fair

Reagan appealed to the “George Wallace-inclined voters” and to white supremacy in his stump speech at the Neshoba County Fair, mere miles away from where three civil rights workers were murdered by the Klan in 1964.

Aug. 3, 1946: J. C. Farmer Killed

J. C. Farmer, a 19-year-old African American WWII veteran, was killed by a mob of 20 white men.

Aug. 3, 1885: Florida Constitution Adopted

The Florida Constitution of 1885 mandated separate and unequal educational systems for Black and white students, reinforcing racial segregation.

James Baldwin Freedom Day Selma 1964 | Zinn Education Project

Aug. 2, 1924: James Baldwin Born

James Baldwin was born in Harlem, New York.

Aug. 2, 1869: First “Redeemer” Government Established in Tennessee

The first “Redeemer” government is established in Tennessee after conservatives gain control of the state’s General Assembly, ushering in an era of Jim Crow segregation laws.

Aug. 1, 1952: Sarah Keys Refuses to Give Up Her Seat on a Bus

Sarah Keys refused to give up her seat on a state-to-state charter bus, prompting the landmark court case, Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company.

Aug. 1, 1944: Racist Wildcat Strike Shuts Down Philadelphia

Not wanting Black coworkers to be given the same positions and pay, a contingent of Philadelphia Transit Company (PTC) workers staged a wildcat strike and withheld their labor.

Detail of portrait of Frank Little by Nicole Schulman.

Aug. 1, 1917: Labor Organizer Frank Little Lynched

IWW labor organizer Frank Little was lynched from a railroad trestle.

Poster for an event in Worcester, Massachusetts in 1849, to commemorate the end of slavery in the British West Indies.

Aug. 1, 1834: Britain Passes Slavery Abolition Act

August First Day became a symbol of hope for enslaved people and abolitionists in the United States when Britain passed the Slavery Abolition Act in 1834, abolishing slavery throughout its colonies around the world.

Odawa Chief Pontiac Meets with Gladwin | Zinn Education Project

July 31, 1763: Chief Pontiac Wins Battle of Bloody Run at Fort Detroit

Fighting alongside Odawa Chief Pontiac, the unified Native warriors defeated 250 British soldiers during their siege at Fort Detroit during Pontiac’s War.