People today might not understand being dressed up, like you described, in the heat.
You wanted to present your best selves. There was no one in jeans and T-shirts that I recall. There were men who had suit jackets on and there were men who just had shirts and ties on. But I don’t think anything like you would see at a march today where there would be ball caps and jeans and T-shirts and so forth.
African Methodist Episcopal Zion Bishop W. Darin Moore, from left, Bishop Vashti McKenzie, the Rev. James Forbes and the Rev. Otis Moss Jr. pose together during a 50th anniversary celebration of the March on Washington in August 2013. Photo courtesy of McKenzie
What did it mean for you to attend the March on Washington?
Of course, I protested when they came and got me from camp but you knew it was an important event and you had to be there. My mother’s sisters were covering the march. They were writing, they were keeping track of what was going on. So I was the runner while they were sitting under the trees. You could hear like a cheer, like somebody special was coming through the crowd. And people would part and make way for people to come through. And so part of my job was to run to the steps and see who was coming through. I’d run up and, ah, there’s (entertainer) Sammy Davis Jr.
Did you see signs of other people of faith?
I don’t remember seeing anybody carrying Bibles there. But you were there because Martin Luther King said we need to be here and we need to have a demonstration. There needs to be a show of hands, if you will, a show of bodies to emphasize that this is important. And by today’s standards, it is amazing that it happened. There were no cellphones. There was no internet. There was no Google. There was no tweet. There was no Facebook that said we all have to be in Washington, D.C., on August the 28th. And then a quarter of a million people show up at the right place at the right time. Not just there because King said you needed to be there but it was a personal investment that says I have a concern about this and I’m willing to invest myself and time to make a collective impact.
Religious participation in the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom exceeded all expectations in 1963. In addition to many banners and signs designating specific religious groups, many churchmen and women marched as Protestants, Catholics and Jews, united in their support of full equality for all American citizens. More than half the signs in the march were those of churches, synagogues and related agencies. RNS archive photo by Seth Muse
What do you think is its significance for the nation 60 years later?
That every generation is going to have to do it again. That civil rights and justice work is never one and done. Every generation must cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge of its time. And so here we are again, fighting our grandfather’s, our ancestors’ battles. When you add it all up, we have less voting rights now than we did in the 1950s when I was in middle school.
Do you think women’s roles in the Civil Rights Movement were not noticed or recognized as much as they should have been either in the plans for the march or in the march itself?
There were not many women I could see on stage from my vantage point. I wasn’t that close but I wasn’t that far away either. The only female voice I remember hearing was Mahalia Jackson singing. She has an iconic voice. I don’t believe they got the recognition they deserved or the place or the credit.
