The “I Am A Man” poster was originally designed for the Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike. . Yet the city of Memphis expected garbage collectors to work long hours for meager wages and without overtime pay. The "I am a Man" Plaza is located next to Clayborn Temple, a key rallying point for the historic 1968 Memphis sanitation strike. HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate. Jones, who courageously waged the battle on behalf of striking sanitation workers. Rev. There are about 40 people at I Am a Man Plaza. On February 11, hundreds of workers came to a meeting at the Memphis Labor Temple, furious with their working conditions. Protesters marched wearing “I Am A Man” sandwich boards, demanding that they be treated with dignity. “We were fighting for our rights, that’s what we were fighting for. The University of Memphis does not discriminate against students, employees, or … Office Products Hello, Sign in. . Contact for price. MEMPHIS, Tenn. — "I Am a Man Plaza" is one of the most expensive public art projects ever in Memphis. Memphis was paying full-time employees a meager minimum wage, then just $1.60 an hour. But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! New videos feature Rev. When workers put up picket signs declaring "I Am a Man," everyone knew exactly what they were talking about. This poster was used during the Poor People’s Campaign in Washington, D.C., during summer 1968. Find high-quality I Am A Man Memphis stock photos and editorial news pictures from Getty Images. The City of Memphis honors Solid Waste employees and their families by helping them further their educational goals with the I AM A MAN Scholarship Fund. Filmed 10/10/2003. 50 years ago, Memphis sanitation workers went on strike. Directed by Jonathan Epstein. I Am A Man: Memphis Sanitation Strike 1968. The weeks of strikes and protests are where the “I am a Man” campaign was born. Today is supposed to be a family day so there are a few children walking around in the small crowd. Author. That night they raised $1,600 to support the Movement. Twice a week we compile our most fascinating features and deliver them straight to you. Howard Greenberg Gallery. I AM A MAN: The Memphis Sanitation Workers Strike 1968 online exhibit lesson plan template and teaching resources. Bettmann via Getty Images All Rights Reserved. Their stand marked an early fight for financial justice for workers of color as part of the civil rights movement. Richard L Copley . There’s another walk that started at 3:00 p.m. near Audubon Park. For More Information. Their compensation, 65 cents per hour, was so low that many were eligible for welfare and food stamps. A visit to the city can be a solemn pilgrimage, but Memphis also has much to offer, including the moving I AM A MAN Plaza and Beale Street, once the center of the city’s Black nightlife. “I was in every march, all of ’em, with that sign: I AM A MAN,” recalls former sanitation worker Ozell Ueal. With Elmore Nickleberry, Leon Caldwell Jr., Mauricio Calvo, Jonh T. Fisher. The City established the fund in 2018 to honor the more than 1,300 Sanitation Strikers of 1968. “Class had always been an issue in the civil rights movement, but in the late '60s [it] was having to deal with it explicitly,” says Steve Estes, author of I Am a Man! WATCH: Sanitation worker from "I am a Man" campaign said he's still ready to march for justice Share By: Valerie Calhoun, FOX13Memphis.com Updated: June 11, 2020 - 6:04 PM They took a stand, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. came to Memphis to join the cause. The city of Memphis officially unveiled its I Am A Man Plaza on Thursday next to Clayborn Temple, a key rallying point for the historic 1968 Memphis sanitation strike. The area features a sculpture along with a wall filled with the names of … Contact For Price. 20 × 16 in. In 1968, in Memphis, Tennessee, the labor movement and the civil rights movement came together in a monumental struggle for human and public employee rights. View all. According to the King Institute at Stanford, the strike kicked off successfully with a several-hundred-person sit-in, which led the city council to acknowledge the sanitation workers’ union and support raises. Green, explores the racial and gender undertones of a Memphis sanitation strike slogan in 1968 – “I Am a Man.” Emerging from a history of enslavement, African-Americans learn that the civil rights movement didn’t guarantee complete freedom (Green 466). A new plaza created to honor the sanitation workers who went on strike in 1968. Digitized August 2011. What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers? "I AM A MAN" became the slogan of the Memphis Sanitation Strike and was derived from the ideals seen in the declaration of independence “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights." On March 28, 1968, King returned to Memphis to lead a march with Lawson in support of the strike. New videos feature Rev. This poster was used during the Poor People’s Campaign in Washington, D.C., during summer 1968. “And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out. Directed by Jonathan Epstein. The article, written by author and University of Texas assistant professor Laurie B. “Race, Gender, and Labor in 1960s Memphis: ‘I Am a Man’ and the Meaning of Freedom.” Journal of Urban History 30.3 (2004): 465-489. The signs, says Estes, “became a rallying cry for the movement.”. The fatalities sparked outrage—workers had been lobbying the city in vain for properly functioning equipment. After Ernest Withers (1922-2007) received his first camera in high school, he quickly began documenting events and people in his immediate community. The protest turned ugly when an outside group infiltrated the marchers and became violent, leading to the death of an African American teenager. U.S. National Guard troops block off Beale Street as Civil Rights marchers wearing placards reading, "I AM A MAN" pass by on March 29, 1968. By The Daily Memphian Staff June 03, 2020 A visit to the city can be a solemn pilgrimage, but Memphis also has much to offer, including the moving I AM A MAN Plaza and Beale Street, once the center of the city’s Black nightlife. Grade Level. “I was in every march, all of ’em, with that sign: I AM A MAN,” recalls former sanitation worker Ozell Ueal. During the Civil Rights Movement at the Memphis sanitation strike in 1968, "I Am a Man!" Getty/The Daily Beast When the Reverend James Lawson shouted “ I am a man,” fifty years ago today, thousands of Memphis garbage strikers first echoed him—then millions of Americans did. They changed the course of history, not only for solid waste employees in Memphis, but across the nation, as well. Reverend Ralph Jackson charged the crowd to not rest until "justice and jobs" prevailed for all black Americans. The Initiative for the Advancement of Males via Academic Mentoring and Networking in Teacher Education (I AM A MAN...I Teach) is a program designed to target, recruit, and develop to become teachers in SCS and local charter schools, with an emphasis on recruiting men of color. I AM A MAN Plaza, is a large-scale experiential public sculpture commissioned to pay tribute to the members of the pivotal 1968 Sanitation Workers’ Strike and the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. A focal point of the Civil Rights Movement, the strike brought Dr. King to Memphis, Tennessee where he was assassinated. by We Are Memphis on 04/20/18. Add to an Existing Learning … On February 1, Echol Cole and Robert Walker, two sanitation workers, were crushed to death in a garbage compactor where they were taking shelter from the rain. “I Am A Man” VR Experience is an interactive virtual reality experience set to the historic events of the African- American Civil Rights Movement. 50.8 × 40.6 cm. I AM A MAN seeks to heighten awareness of the contributions made by citizens of our city whose courage and determination boldly changed history, and whose character sits at the heart of the place we call home. The city of Memphis officially unveiled its I Am A Man Plaza on Thursday next to Clayborn Temple, a key rallying point for the historic 1968 Memphis sanitation strike. : Race, Manhood, and the Civil Rights Movement. “A lot of people think of King as an all-American hero,” Sokol says. .I Teach. Wayne State University Walter P. Reuther Library. Two other men had died this way in 1964, but the city refused to replace the defective equipment. One of the last pictures to be taken of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. speaking to a mass rally on April 3, 1968 in Memphis. When the city then refused to provide compensation to the deceased workers’ families, workers walked off the job in disgust. Your focus needs to be the National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Motel. New to the exhibit is the Mountaintop Theatre, showing the powerful "Mountaintop" speech, the last one Dr. King gave the evening before he died. From the I Am A Man Exhibit Symposium. Email Dr. Alfred Hall, Assistant Dean of the College of Education. Download premium images you can't get anywhere else. Gelatin silver print; printed later. With the slogan, "I am a man," workers in Memphis sought financial justice in a strike that fatefully became Martin Luther King, Jr.'s final cause. Object Name poster referenced United States: Tennessee, Memphis Physical Description paper (overall material) white, red (overall color) Measurements overall: 28 in x 22 in; 71.12 cm x … I AM A MAN seeks to heighten awareness of the contributions made by citizens of our city whose courage and determination boldly changed history, and whose character sits at the heart of the place we call home. Skip to main content.ca. The strike also drew Martin Luther King, Jr. and fatefully became the setting for his “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” speech and his assassination. ", In a speech to a 25,000-person crowd in Memphis on March 18, 1968, King affirmed the value of the sanitation workers’ labor, saying, “whenever you are engaged in work that serves humanity and is for the building of humanity, it has dignity, and it has worth.”. Clip extracted December 2011. New York. 5.2k members in the LeftWingMaleAdvocates community. Jones, who courageously waged the battle on behalf of striking sanitation workers. There’s another walk that started at 3:00 p.m. near Audubon Park. This gallery expands the story of the 1968 Memphis sanitation strike. signs were used to answer the same question. National Guard troops lined Beale Street during a protest on March 29 , 1968. When we remember the Memphis Sanitation Strike, with its iconic “I AM A MAN” signs, it’s usually just as the backdrop for the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. Police close in on group of striking garbage workers in downtown Memphis on February 23, 1968 when a melee broke out during a peaceful demonstration by some 1500 strikers. "I AM A MAN," the 1968 Memphis sanitation strike slogan, has become emblematic of African Americans' quest for equality during the civil rights movement; however, its … James Lawson and T.O. In Memphis, the sanitation workers’ struggle continued, with the added support of King’s widow, Coretta Scott King. © 2021 A&E Television Networks, LLC. Find high-quality I Am A Man Memphis stock photos and editorial news pictures from Getty Images. I Am a Man: Sanitation Workers Strike, Memphis, Tennessee, March 28th, 1968, Ernest Withers, 1968. This was part of a larger trend of the time. James Lawson and T.O. Steve Schapiro. Rev. Contact gallery. 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