Listen & Learn Speaker Series
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2021 Speaker Series
September 2021 | Dr. Fred Jones test test test test test
“Nightmare at the Lorraine Motel”
Featured Speaker – Contributing Author, Dr. Fred Jones
This book is a collaboration of different authors looking at Dr. Martin Luther King from the perspective of not so much the “Dream”, but the “Nightmare of America” from the thought process of Dr. King’s last night on earth, April 3rd. Dr. Jones writes a chapter on Politics that looks at the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955 which was Dr. King’s first entrance into the mainstream fight of the Civil Rights movement.
To purchase your copy of Nightmare at the Lorraine Motel ahead of the event, email Dr. Jones at fjonesdesoto@gmail.com.
October 2021 | Dale Long test test test test test
Mr. Dale Long is one of few remaining survivors of the 1963 bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church where four of his friends were tragically killed and twenty-seven people were injured. Mr. Long and his late brother escaped unscathed. We took an hour to “walk in his shoes” as he shared his story of that painful day in history.
November 2021 | Captain Richard G. Stewart, Jr., JAGC US Navy (Ret)
In honor of our military veterans, we highlighted the accomplishments and shared in the story of Captain Richard G. Stewart, Jr., Esquire. Captain Stewart grew up during Jim Crow in Shreveport, LA, and attended segregated schools. A career military officer, he has 24 years of service in the United States Navy and was the first African-American to command a Naval Legal Service officer and reach captain rank in the Navy Judge Advocate General’s (JAG) Corp in 1991.
2022 Summer Speaker Series
May 2022 | Qubilah Shabazz, Daughter of Malcolm X and Betty Shabazz
Qubilah Shabazz is the daughter of American former Muslim minister and human rights activist Malcolm X. She was born on December 25, 1960, in Queens, New York City, New York, to Malcolm X and Betty Shabazz. She witnessed the assassination of her father when she was just four years old. The incident took place on February 21, 1965, when Malcolm X was preparing to address the ‘Organization of Afro-American Unity’ (OAAU) at the ‘Audubon Theatre and Ballroom’ in Manhattan.
June 2022 | Ms. Opal Lee, “Grandmother of Juneteenth”
Known as the “Grandmother of Juneteenth,” Ms. Opal Lee was present on June 17, 2021, when President Joe Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act bill that established June 19 or “Juneteenth” a federal holiday. Ms. Lee said on that day, “Now we can celebrate freedom from the 19th of June to the 4th of July!”
July 2022 | Rev. Peter Johnson, Prominent Civil Rights Leader
Peter Jerome Johnson was born in 1945 in Plaquemine, Louisiana. He began his entry into the civil rights movement as a teenager when he convinced a hometown gang of young toughs, calling themselves the Trojans, to transform themselves into an NAACP youth chapter in which Peter served as president. He attended schools in Plaquemine and decided to attend Southern University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. By the time he reached Southern, he was almost a full-time civil rights worker. His motto was, “Have picket, will travel”.