This year marks the sixtieth anniversary of Freedom Summer 1964, and the training that took place in Oxford, Ohio on the campus of the Western College for Women. Moments @ the Art Museum provides a short background to Freedom Summer, and also a summary of the Art Museum’s activities this Fall as we prepare to reopen on August 27, 2024.
Freedom Summer, also known as the Mississippi Summer Project, was a 1964 voter registration effort sponsored by civil rights organizations including the Congress on Racial Equality (CORE) and the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Aimed at increasing Black American voter registration in Mississippi, the Freedom Summer workers included Black Mississippians and hundreds of out-of-state, predominately white volunteers.
Around 800 volunteers were trained in June 1964 at the Western College for Women, now part of Miami University’s Western campus. They learned not only how to help register Black Americans to vote, but to peacefully resist violence that they knew would be encountered in the South. They also set up Freedom Schools, Community Centers and libraries.
Philip Morsberger, 1964; Missing No. 1, Oil on Canvas. On Loan to the Richard and Carole Cocks Art Museum from Butler Institute of Art.
Three young civil rights workers — James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner — were murdered in Mississippi by members of the Ku Klux Klan soon after leaving Oxford. Miami University honors them with the outdoor memorial located on the Western Campus close to the Art Museum. The Western College Campus is recognized by the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center as a Freedom Station, and the Freedom Summer ‘64 Memorial is a National Historic Landmark. Freedom Summer’s legacy continues in Oxford and you can read more about Freedom Summer, find educational resources, and learn about its continuing impact on the Office for Transformational and Inclusive Excellence (OTIE) website.
Photograph by Scott Kissell; University Communications and Marketing, Miami University
A short RCCAM video titled Remembering Freedom Summer, (view below) narrated by former Student Body President Nyah Smith ‘24 provides an overview of this history and legacy, and invites viewers to visit the Freedom Summer ‘64 Memorial. Please note that for visitors with accessibility needs, the memorial can be accessed from adjacent street parking.
Coming this Fall, RCCAM will present a special exhibition, supported by FotoFocus Cincinnati, titled: Through Their Lens: Photographing Freedom Summer. This exhibition takes a new approach to the Freedom Summer by focusing on the backstories of those behind the lens. The exhibition presents some of the most important photographers who documented the historic project, including Danny Lyon, Ted Polumbaum, Herbert Randall, Steve Schapiro, Bob Fletcher, and Tamio Wakayama. As part of the exhibitions programming at RCCAM, photographer Herbert Randall shares backstories on the Freedom Summer 1964 project in Oxford, Ohio, and Mississippi on October 9, 5-7PM. Randall will appear live on screen for this in-person program moderated by Ann Elizabeth Armstrong.
During October, RCCAM will present two short films in our Auditorium on Fridays at 3pm: Training for Freedom, PBS/Miami University (Oct 4, 18), and Reading Freedom Summer, made by Andy Rice and class at Miami University (Oct 11, 25). Further program information will be announced in the near future. On Wednesday October 16 at 12pm, Curator of Exhibitions Jason Shaiman will offer a Spotlight Tour on the photography of Freedom Summer by Danny Lyon.
In addition to these public showings, school groups, University classes, and other groups, can book our Auditorium to watch either film at other times, and combine with a visit to the exhibition and/or the nearby Freedom Summer ‘64 Memorial. Please contact rccam-ed@miamioh.edu to register your interest. You can read more about the history of Freedom Summer ‘64 in Bruce Watson’s book, Freedom Summer: The Savage Season of 1964 That Made Mississippi Burn and Made America a Democracy (Penguin, 2010).
We thank FotoFocus Cincinnati, and the Menard Family Center for Democracy and Department of Media, Journalism, and Film’s Diana Stark Speaker Series in Journalism as program partners at Miami University. We also thank the Office for Transformational and Inclusive Excellence at Miami University, the Miriam W. Howard Art Museum Fund, and Richard and Susan Momeyer for their generous support.
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