Reverend Ralph Abernathy discusses his work with the Montgomery Bus Boycott, his work and friendship with Martin Luther King, Jr., SCLC, the March on Washington and many other events.

Dr. William Anderson discusses the Civil Rights Movement in Albany, GA, and his role as a local leader in the community. Anderson invited Martin Luther King, Jr. to Albany to speak, and what was supposed to be one talk became a movement which lasted several months. Anderson also talks about the negotiations between the Civil Rights leaders and the Albany city government, and his interactions with Police Chief Laurie Pritchett.

James Armstrong discusses the political and social climate of Birmingham in the 1950's. He describes what it was like to live in a segregated community, his involvement in the Civil Rights Movement, including attending mass meetings, and Fred Shuttlesworth's role in Birmingham.

Joseph Azbell discusses Montgomery, Alabama as it was in 1955, including the the system of segregation in the town and the bus system. He discusses leaders in the Civil Rights Movement and politicians in Montgomery including, E.D. Nixon, Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., Rev. Ralph Abernathy, Rufus Lewis and Mayor Tacky.

Melvin "Mel" Bailey served on the Birmingham police force before becoming sheriff of Jefferson County, Alabama. Bailey helped shape the police's relationship with the civil rights activists of the early 1960s.

Melba Beals discusses her time at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, as one of the Little Rock Nine in 1957-58.

Bevel worked on the Chicago open-house movement in 1966, the anti-Vietnam War movement in 1967, and the Memphis sanitation workers strike and Poor People's Campaign in 1968. Bevel left SCLC in 1969 to form the Making of a Man clinic in 1970. He later founded Students for Education and Economic Development (SEED).

Blackwell became a prominent participant in "Freedom Summer." She later received a master's degree from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and served as a community development specialist for the National Council of Negro Women.

Eliza Briggs and her husband, Harry Briggs Sr. discuss participating in the landmark Brown v. Board of Education Case, and the effect it had on their lives.

Harry Briggs, Sr. and his wife, Eliza Briggs, discuss participating in the landmark Brown v. Board of Education Case, and the effect it had on their lives.

Herbert Brownell served as Attorney General under former president Dwight D. Eisenhower. He was instrumental in the appointment of Earl Warren as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and despite pressure from southerners in Congress, Brownell showed consistent support for civil rights initiatives.

Reverend Will D. Campbell describes his time in Nashville, his involvement with the sit-in movements, and his relationship with James Lawson, including Lawson's decision not to withdraw from Vanderbilt University. He also discusses Z. Alexander Looby, John Seigenthaler, Diane Nash and the Freedom Rides.

Gordon Carey, a vital force in the Civil Rights Movement, was the Executive of the Congress of Racial Equality when it formed in 1942.

Hodding Carter discusses the white moderate reaction to the tumultuous events in Mississippi in the late 50's and early 60's, and the harassment he and his family were subjected to. He discusses segregation, voting restrictions for blacks, white resistance against the changes, the formation of Citizens' Council in Indianola, Mississippi and how the Council influenced the government of Mississippi.

Judge Robert L. Carter worked as legal counsel to the NAACP in 1944, but is most famous for his litigation of Brown v. Board of Education and NAACP v. Alabama. He has served as a Nixon-appointed, U.S. District Court judge for the Southern District of New York since 1972.

Charles Clark was appointed by President Nixon as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. After serving as Chief Judge of this court for eleven years, Clark retired from his position in 1992.

Jim Clark was Sheriff of Selma, Alabama from 1958 to 1966. His unquestionably violent response to blacks attempting to register to vote was a factor in President Lyndon B. Johnson's approval of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

Kenneth Clark was the first African-American to earn a doctorate in psychology from Columbia University. He and his wife, Mamie Phipps Clark, used his studies in social science to combat racial discrimination.

As an active member of SNCC during the 1960's, Courtland Cox served as a representative on the planning staff for the 1963 March on Washington. He later worked in Washington, D.C. as the Director of the Minority Business Opportunity Commission, Director of the Office of International Business, and Special Assistant to the Mayor for Economic Development.

Dave Dennis worked closely with Bob Moses in Mississippi and was active in many Civil Rights organizations during the 1960's. He currently works for the Algebra Project, an organization founded by Moses to improve minority children's mathematics education.

During his time as attorney and Assistant Attorney General for the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division from 1960-1967, John Doar authorized FBI investigations into the murders of several Civil Rights activists during Freedom Summer. He later served as Special Counsel to the House of Representatives.

Ivanhoe Donaldson was an active member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. He helped to feed Mississippi sharecroppers and tenant farmers, participated in demonstrations in Virginia, and became one of the SNCC organizers in Selma, Alabama in 1965.

Virginia Durr was an active supporter of the Civil Rights Movement despite her prejudiced upbringing in Alabama. She worked with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt to combat racism, and despite unpopularity among whites, supported the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee workers in Montgomery, Alabama.

Reverend Joseph Ellwanger, one of the few white Southern ministers involved in civil rights work, assisted Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in planning the Birmingham demonstrations. In 1965, Ellwanger and 72 other white Alabamians successfully organized a peaceful marched in Selma.

Harold Engstrom served as chairman of the Little Rock City Building Code Appeals Board, and was also the national director of the Society of Professional Engineers in Arkansas. Notably, Engstrom was president of the Little Rock School Board in 1957 when Central High School was being desegregated.

Don Evans was a victim of the city of Birmingham's brutal response to SCLC demonstrations in 1963.

Darrell Evers was a distinguished artist and former Chairman Emeritus of the NAACP National Board of Directors. In 1962, when Evers was nine years old, his father was murdered in Jackson, Mississippi. Though the case initially ended in a mistrial in 1964 by an all-white jury, Byron De La Beckwith was later arrested and convicted of his crime in the 1990's. Evers spent his life committed to combating racial injustice and hate crimes.

While attending Alcorn A&M College, Mylie Evers, nee Myrlie Beasley, met and later married Medgar Evers. Undaunted by such a harrowing event, Myrlie moved to California, where she earned a degree in sociology at Pomona College in 1968. In 1988, after a second marriage and a move to California, Myrlie Evers-Williams became the first black woman to be appointed to the Los Angeles Board of Public Works, and later served as the first woman chairperson of the NAACP from 1995 to 1998.

James Founder helped to found the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) in 1942. In 1961, as Director of CORE Farmer and other CORE members organized the first Freedom Rides. Despite encountering opposition from General Robert F. Kennedy, the Interstate Commerce Commission, and Mississippi law-enforcement, Farmer's pursuit against racial segregation and for social justice continued. In 1998, Farmer was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Bill Clinton.

Influenced by Arkansas conservatives, Governor Orval Faubus dramatically opposed the 1957 integration of Little Rock Central High School. Faubus initiated a tense, well-publicized confrontation between the state and the federal governments, which ended only after President Eisenhower federalized the Arkansas National Guard and employed the 101st Airborne Division to ensure the safe entry of the nine black students into the building. Faubus served as governor of Arkansas for a record six years.

James Forman became heavily involved in the Civil Rights Movement after covering the Little Rock school desegregation crisis for the Chicago Defender. He served as Executive Secretary for SNCC from 1961 to 1966, and participated in the in the planning of the March on Washington.

A.G. Gaston, a black millionaire, represented the conservative interests of Birmingham, Alabama's black community in 1963. Gaston's initial ambivalence toward organizations such as the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) changed, however, after former Commissioner of Public Safety, Bull Connor, arrested, fire-hosed, and set police dogs upon children protesters on "D-Day" in May 1963. Gaston later contributed to or founded such institutions such as YMCA, the Boys and Girls Club, Tuskegee University, and many others.

Georgia Gilmore participated in the Montgomery Bus Boycott by walking to and from work every day, and as well as by collecting money for the boycott and presenting it in church.

Ernest Green was one of "The Little Rock Nine," the group of nine students who desegregated Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1957. The first black student to graduate from Central High, Green later earned a B.A. and M.A. from Michigan State University. He served as the Director of the A. Philip Randolph Education Fund, was Assistant Secretary of Labor from 1977 to 1981, and currently works for Lehman Brothers. He and the other members of the Little Rock Nine were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 1999 by President Clinton.

As an active member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), Lawrence Guyot helped organize and develop voter registration drives throughout Mississippi. He was a chairman of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party and a delegate to the 1964 Democratic Convention in Atlantic City.

Born Sandra Cason, Casey Hayden was a founding member of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) on the campus of Texas University at Austen. Hayden helped with voting initiatives for African Americans in Mississippi as a volunteer for SNCC, and later addressed issues of gender inequality in the Movement and the country.

Tom Hayden was an active member of the Civil Rights Movement from the 1950's to the 1970's. He helped to found SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) in 1959, and later took part in the Freedom Rides. In 1968, Hayden was one of eight protestors charged with conspiracy and inciting to riot at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. He was elected to the California State Assembly in 1982, and was then elected to Senate ten years later.

James L. Hicks was editor of the Amsterdam News from 1955 to 1966 and then again 1972 to 1977. While working for the News, Hicks covered the Emmett Till case, desegregation efforts in Little Rock, Arkansas and Oxford, Mississippi. Though many of his findings on the controversial Till case were initially overlooked, Hicks was later able to bring the evidence to light and expose the corruption of the judicial system in Sumner, Mississippi.

Nicholas Katzenbach was appointed to the position of Attorney General of the United States in 1965 by President Lyndon Johnson, and later served as Secretary of State for three years. Notably, during his time as Attorney General, Katzenbach was involved in drafting the Voting Rights Act.

Marcia Webb Lecky was the secretary of the senior class at Central High in Little Rock, Arkansas at the time of the Little Rock Nine's integration of the school.

Frederick Leonard was a participant in the Freedom Rides of 1961. Leonard was able to escape serious harm from a Mississippi mob protesting the Rides, and was able to talk about his experiences in one of the most acclaimed interviews of the Eyes on the Prize series.

While attending Tennessee State University in 1960, Leo Lillard took an active role in Nashville sit-ins and marches. He also assisted the Freedom Riders in 1961.

Colonel Floyd Mann was appointed director of Alabama's Department of Public Safety in 1959. Mann demonstrated his commitment to his position, when he and one hundred state troopers protected a bus of Freedom Riders demonstrating in Montgomery

Although he grew up in a segregated community in Ohio, Reverend Orloff Miller became a Unitarian Universalist minister who actively supported the Civil Rights Movement. On the evening of March 9, 1965, after flying into Selma, Montgomery to support a number of marches at the bequest of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Miller and two fellow ministers were attacked by a mob of white men with clubs. Miller attended the funeral of Revered James Reeb, who died from his injuries, and then participated in the last day of the march from Selma to Montgomery.

Leola Montgomery was the mother of Linda Brown and wife of Oliver Brown, a plaintiff in the Brown vs. Board of Education decision in 1950, which declared segregation illegal.

As a president of the NAACP, Amzie Moore was peripherally involved in the Emmett Till murder trial. He also spearheaded voter registration drives in Mississippi and helped the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP). Moore also organized the local Head Start in his Cleveland, Mississippi community in 1966, and helped to create housing for low-income families.

Rachel West Nelson, nee Rachel West, grew up in Selma, Alabama with parents who supported and participated in the voting rights campaign in Selma. She is the co-author of Selma, Lord, Selma, recollection of the Selma marches. Her book was later adapted into a film which aired on "The Wonderful World of Disney" in 1999.

Gussie Nesbitt was a participant in the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and attended meetings of the Montgomery Improvement Association.

E.D. Nixon led the local Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, the local NAACP, the Montgomery Welfare League, and the Montgomery Voters League at various points in his life. His activism was a catalyst for the Montgomery Bus Boycott and its success, and was also instrumental in forming the Montgomery Improvement Association.

Raised in a socially conscious and active family, Dr. Peter Orris participated in social justice organizations in college such as the Civil Right Coordinating Committee and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). With SNCC, he became part of the battle for voting rights for blacks in Mississippi, and helped organize communications for the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party at the Democratic Convention of 1964.

Governor John Patterson was elected, in his deceased father's stead, to the position of Attorney General of Alabama in 1954. Four years later, with the support of the Ku Klux Klan, Patterson won the race for governor of Alabama. During his positions, Patterson banned the NAACP from Alabama, brought legal action against Tuskegee business and Montgomery bus boycotters, defended his state's right to be segregated and fought against black voter registration. In matters other than Civil Rights, however, Patterson passed legislation that improved transportation and healthcare in Alabama.

James Peck helped to organize and represent the National Maritime Union, worked with the War Resisters League in protest of World War II, and joined the Congress of Racial Equality when the war ended. In 1947 he participated in the first freedom ride with Bayard Rustin, and years later he participated in Freedom Rides organized by CORE in 1961. He went on to help lead and organize CORE activities for seventeen years.

Laurie Pritchett was the chief of police of Albany, Georgia during the Albany Movement. Aware that police brutality would draw negative attention from the media and other states, Pritchett instructed his officers to fight the Movement without violence, and to conduct large-scale arrests. As a result, Albany county protests generated very little publicity, and the movement was largely unsuccessful there.