James l farmer civil rights movement
Civil rights movement key figures!
James Farmer
(1920-1999)
Who Was James Farmer?
James Farmer was a star college debater before going on to lead the Congress for Racial Equality, which would become one of the most prominent organizations of the Civil Rights era.
James l farmer civil rights movement
A devotee of Gandhi's nonviolent strategies, Farmer also organized the historic Freedom Rides, which lead to interstate travel desegregation.
Background and Education
Freedom Ride leader James Leonard Farmer Jr.
was born on January 12, 1920, in Marshall, Texas. His mother was a teacher and his father a minister who was also the first African American citizen to earn a doctorate in the state. Surrounded by literature and learning, the young Farmer was an excellent student, skipping grades and becoming a freshman at Wiley College in 1934 at the age of 14.
While there he continued to excel as part of the debate team, and his eloquence and storytelling abilities would later be heard nationally as an adult.
(Farmer's life as a star college orator was po