Standing on My Sister's Shoulders

The story of the Civil Rights movement in 1960s Mississippi is incomplete without an understanding of the courage and sacrifices of reform-minded women. One of the most notable, of course, was Rosa Parks, but filmmaker Laura J. Lipson's Standing on My Sister's Shoulders also introduces such unsung heroines as Fannie Lou Hamer, Annie Devine, and Victoria Gray Adams, who endured arrest and police beatings after co-founding the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, as well as the mother of Emmett Till, a boy castrated and murdered by a white mob, who inspired other African-American women to fight for their children's rights. We also hear from Unita Blackwell (now mayor of Mayersville, MS), who reveals her old fear of being lynched by Klansmen; Mae Bertha Carter, the first woman to enroll her kids in a desegregated school (whose story was also chronicled in The Intolerable Burden [VL-1/04]), and Joan Trumpauer, a white champion of integration efforts and graduate of a "black college." A powerful must-see slice of American social history, this is highly recommended. Editor's Choice. Aud: C, P. (T. Keogh)