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Joan Trumpauer Mulholland

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Joan Trumpauer Mulholland
File:Joan Trumpauer Mulholland.jpg
Mulholland at age 19, in 1961 mugshot
Born
Joan Trumpauer

(1941-09-14) September 14, 1941 (age 83)
NationalityUnited States
EducationDuke University. Tougaloo College
Known forFreedom Riders

Joan Trumpauer Mulholland (born September 14, 1941) is an American civil rights activist and a Freedom Rider from Arlington, Virginia. She is known for taking part in sit-ins, being the first white to integrate a black college and to be a part of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, [1] joining Freedom Rides, and being held on death row in Parchman Penitentiary, just to name a few.

Early life

Mulholland was born Joan Trumpauer in the Deep South and came of age during the African–American Civil Rights Movement. Her great-grandparents were slave owners in Georgia; after the United States Civil War, they became sharecroppers. Her mother was the very first in her family to marry a “Yankee.” Her family was not wealthy by any means, but could afford black help. Mulholland's mother became very ill after she was born, so a black woman raised Joan for the first three months of her life.

Her parents were racists and were very forward about their support for segregation. Mulholland recalled her mother saying, “No matter how bad things were, at least ya aren't black.” Mulholland was raised Christian, and recalled singing the children's song, “Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight, Jesus loves the little children of the world.” The morality she was taught at church was in direct contrast to the segregation around her and hatred her parents espoused.[2]

Mulholland later recalled an occasion that forever changed her perspective when visiting her family in Georgia. Her childhood friend Mary and her dared each other to walk into “nigger” town, which was located on the other side of the train tracks. Mulholland stated her eyes were opened by the experience: “No one said anything to me, but the way they shrunk back and became invisible, showed me that they believed that they weren't as good as me.” She said she vowed to herself that if she could do anything, to help be a part of the civil rights movement and change the world, she would. [3]

Her desire for activism created a tension and divide between her and her mother. She had planned on going to a small, church university in Ohio or Kentucky but her parents would not allow it, for fear that the schools may be integrated.[4] Instead she applied and was accepted to Duke University in Durham, North Carolina.

Activism

In the spring of 1961, Mulholland participated in her first of many sit-ins. Being a white, southern woman, her civil rights activism was not understood. She was branded as mentally ill, and was taken in for testing after her first arrest. Out of fear of shake downs, Mulholland wore a skirt with a large, ruffled hem where she would hide paper that she had crumpled until it was soft and then folded neatly. With this paper, Mulholland was able to write a diary, talking about her experiences, that still exists today. The movement became her home and she was never to return to her family again, as she was disowned by her biological family.[5]

She dropped out of Duke after being pressured by the dean of women to stop her activism.[6]

In the summer of 1961, the historic Freedom Riders, a group of black and white activists, challenged the illegally segregated buses and bus stations of the south by refusing to travel separately. 13 riders left on two Greyhound buses and rode to the upper south. It was said that Anniston, Alabama, was the most dangerous of all towns the riders stopped at along their way. On Mother’s Day, the two buses arrived in Anniston and were set on fire. Churchgoers would watch with their children as the riders attempted to escape the flames of the bus, only to be beaten by the townspeople until the police stopped the chaos. After this event, many thought they saw the end of the Freedom Rides. However, a call was made to Mulholland, who was in D.C., and Diane Nash asking for more riders.[5]

Mulholland, along with Stokely Carmichael (the activist and later SNCC chairman), Hank Thomas, and others took a different freedom ride. The group took a plane to New Orleans, then rode on an Illinois Central train to Jackson, Mississippi, with members of Congress of Racial Equality.[5]

After the new group of Freedom Riders was arrested for refusing to leave a bus waiting area in Jackson, Mississippi, Mulholland and others were put inside a paddy wagon to be taken to the most dreaded prison in Mississippi: Parchman Penitentiary, a jail in the Delta, which is not far from where Emmett Till had been murdered. It was June 1961. Mulholland was 19 at the time and refused to pay bail.

On the ride there, the driver stopped at a house in rural Mississippi. Mulholland and the other activists began to fear for their lives. In retrospect, Mulholland later recounted, the driver had probably needed a pit stop and only desired to frighten the riders.[5]

Even in prison, Mulholland would be segregated from her fellow NAG friends. They were housed on death row for two months. “We were in a segregated cell with 17 women and 3 square feet of floor space for each of us,” she recalled in 2014.[2][7][8] Prior to being locked in cells, the women were stripped and given a vaginal exam. The matron would cleanse her gloved hand prior to each exam with a bucket of liquid that Mulholland said smelled like Lysol.[5]

Soon after Mulholland's release, Charlayne Hunter-Gault and Hamilton E. Holmes became the first African American students to enroll at the University of Georgia. Mulholland thought, “Now if whites were going to riot when black students were going to white schools, what were they going to do if a white student went to a black school?” She then became the first white student to enroll in Tougaloo College in Jackson, where she met Medgar Evers, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Reverend Ed King, and Anne Moody. Two years later, Mulholland was the first white student accepted into Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc..[6]

While Mulholland attended Tougaloo College, many local authorities worried that something might happen between her, a white woman, and one of the black men. Because of this, there were various attempts to shut down Tougaloo. However, the school remained open due to the fact that its charter predated the Jim Crow laws.[5]

Mulholland participated in the May 28, 1963 sit-in at the Woolworth lunch counter in downtown Jackson with 13 other activists, such as fellow Tougaloo student, Anne Moody, professor Dr. John Salter, and white Tougaloo chaplain, Reverend Ed King. The activists were beaten, berated with sugar and condiments found on the counter, and were called communists. One man pointed out of the crowd to Mulholland, calling her "white nigger.".[2][9][10]

The sit-in started with Moody and two other black students, Pearlena Lewis and Memphis Norman, sitting down at the white counter. (Police could not arrest them originally because of a Supreme Court ruling, stating that police had to be invited in by the store manager and could not come in of their own accord. This ruling happened due to a sit-in that Mulholland had taken part in). About the time Mulholland had arrived after watching a picket line be arrested, Norman had been dragged to the floor by former police officer Benny Oliver, who wore tennis shoes, and was being kicked repetitively. The assault continued until an undercover police officer arrested both Norman and Oliver. Moody and Lewis were both torn from their seats later on. Moody had been thrown against the counter. Around this time, Mulholland noticed a man walk past Moody with a knife and called out, "Annie, he's got a knife." Mulholland then walked to the counter and sat down next to Moody and Lewis. People started to yell slurs at Mulholland such as "traitor," "communist," "black bitch," and "white nigger." Moody and Mulholland were grabbed off of their stools together and dragged out of the store. Mulholland's assailant was arrested once outside and Mulholland was allowed to go free. She returned to the lunch counter with Moody. Salter arrived shortly after, joining the two women at the counter. The crowd grew more violent. Salter received a cigarette burn on the back of his neck and a pepper water mix in his eyes. Mulholland started to fear for their lives just before things started to draw to a close. The sit-in ended at about 2:00 p.m. when the president of Tougaloo College got a hold of the National Office of Woolworth, who advised the store manager to shut the store down.[5]

This event ended up being one of the most violent sit-ins. Mulholland recalled being told by reporters that it was one of the most frightening stories they had ever covered on the Civil Rights Movement.

On August 28, 1963, Mulholland helped to plan and put on March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.[5] Mulholland rode to Washington with Reverend Ed King, his wife, and Anne Moody. On their return, the group stopped in a federal park in Tennessee where they spent the night. The next morning, Moody and Mulholland woke before the Kings and went to the bathroom where they found showers. They used showers one at a time and, having forgotten towels, used the paper towels in the bathroom to dry each other off. The women were discovered in the bathroom as two white women walked in, disturbed by Moody and Mulholland's actions. Moody and Mulholland returned to the now awake Kings, told them the story, and were quickly rushed from the park. Moody recalled seeing a group of white women come into view and watch just as the integrated car drove away.[10]

A few days after the March on Washington, the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) set off a bomb at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama just before Sunday morning service. The bomb injured fifteen people and killed four children.[11] Mulholland took a piece of glass from the explosion, glued it to black ebony wood, and fashioned a necklace out of it. She also carried a piece of the glass in her wallet for years, feeling it every time she reached for her change.[5]

She later worked at the Smithsonian Institution, the United States Department of Commerce and the Justice Department, before teaching English as a second language.[7]

Today, Mulholland is retired and living in Virginia. She has five sons.[8] On April 13, 2015, Mulholland did a Q&A with the Naples, Florida community at Barron Collier High School. [12]

Legacy

On May 16, 2011, PBS aired a documentary called Freedom Riders, which featured Mulholland. Mulholland was one of the 40 former college students from across the United States who embarked on a bus ride from Washington, D.C. to New Orleans on May 6–16, 2011, retracing the original route of the Freedom Riders. In her interview for Freedom Riders, she recalls the harrowing conditions at Parchman.[7]

In 2013, her son Loki Mulholland produced a documentary film An Ordinary Hero: The True Story of Joan Trumpauer Mulholland.[13]

References

  1. ^ Delta Sigma Theta Sorority. "Joan Trumpauer Mulholland, First White Initiated into Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. Coming to Barron Collier High School April 13, 2015." NPDN. Naples Daily News, 9 Apr. 2015. Web. 17 May 2015.
  2. ^ a b c Sean Barron (April 24, 2014). "Joan Mulholland's extraordinary life". The Vindicator. Retrieved March 11, 2015.
  3. ^ An Ordinary Hero: The True Story of Joan Trumpauer Mulholland. Prod. Loki Mulholland and K. Danor Gerald. By Loki Mulholland. Dir. Loki Mulholland. Perf. Joan Trumpauer Mulholland, Loki Mulholland, Michael J. O’Brien, Hank Thomas, Dion Diamond, Dorie Ladner, Joyce Lander, Rev. Reginald Green, Luvaghn Brown, Sylvia D. Thompson, Rep. Bennie G. Thompson, Rev. Ed King, Reuben V. Anderson, Eric Etheridge, Robert Luckett, Prof. John R. Salter, Jr. Bridgestone Multimedia Group, 2013. DVD
  4. ^ An Ordinary Hero: The True Story of Joan Trumpauer Mulholland. Prod. Loki Mulholland and K. Danor Gerald. By Loki Mulholland. Dir. Loki Mulholland. Perf. Joan Trumpauer Mulholland, Loki Mulholland, Michael J. O’Brien, Hank Thomas, Dion Diamond, Dorie Ladner, Joyce Lander, Rev. Reginald Green, Luvaghn Brown, Sylvia D. Thompson, Rep. Bennie G. Thompson, Rev. Ed King, Reuben V. Anderson, Eric Etheridge, Robert Luckett, Prof. John R. Salter, Jr. Bridgestone Multimedia Group, 2013. DVD
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i An Ordinary Hero: The True Story of Joan Trumpauer Mulholland. Prod. Loki Mulholland and K. Danor Gerald. By Loki Mulholland. Dir. Loki Mulholland. Perf. Joan Trumpauer Mulholland, Loki Mulholland, Michael J. O’Brien, Hank Thomas, Dion Diamond, Dorie Ladner, Joyce Lander, Rev. Reginald Green, Luvaghn Brown, Sylvia D. Thompson, Rep. Bennie G. Thompson, Rev. Ed King, Reuben V. Anderson, Eric Etheridge, Robert Luckett, Prof. John R. Salter, Jr., Hamid Kizilbash. Bridgestone Multimedia Group, 2013. DVD.
  6. ^ a b ""An Ordinary Hero: The True Story of Joan Trumpauer Mulholland" Screening and Panel Discussion". The National Press Club. March 20, 2014. Retrieved March 11, 2015.
  7. ^ a b c "Joan Trumpauer Mulholland". The American Experience: "Freedom Riders". Retrieved 12 June 2013.
  8. ^ a b "Why We Became Freedom Riders". The Washington Post. May 17, 2007.
  9. ^ Abel, Elizabeth. Signs Of The Times : The Visual Politics Of Jim Crow. Berkeley, Calif: University of California Press, 2010. eBook Collection (EBSCOhost). Web. 14 May 2015.
  10. ^ a b Moody, Anne. Coming of Age in Mississippi. New York: Bantam Dell, 1968. Print.
  11. ^ Eyes on the Prize (IV) - No Easy Walk, 1961-1963 [with English Subtitles]. Dir. Henry Hampton. Perf. Martin Luther King, Jr., Wyatt T. Walker, Charles Sherrod, Et Al. PBS, 1987. YouTube. YouTube, 20 Nov. 2014. Web. 01 May 2015.
  12. ^ Delta Sigma Theta Sorority. "Joan Trumpauer Mulholland, First White Initiated into Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. Coming to Barron Collier High School April 13, 2015." NPDN. Naples Daily News, 9 Apr. 2015. Web. 17 May 2015.
  13. ^ Stanley Nelson (March 11, 2013). "Civil rights pioneer Joan Trumpauer Mulholland shows what ordinary hero can do". Clarion Ledger.

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