Irene Griffin (activist)

Last updated

Irene W. Griffin (November 10, 1927 - March 27, 2012) [1] was an African-American activist, and the first black woman to register to vote in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana. She was married to Rev. Percy Murphy Griffin, also a civil rights activist in that community. [2]

Contents

Activism

Irene was married to Percy Murphy Griffin, [3] and their initial efforts focused on taking on segregationist Judge Leander Perez after Percy returned from serving in World War II. They started a voter registration campaign for black community residents. In 1954, Irene became the first registered African-American woman to vote in Plaquemines Parish. In 1963, their home was bombed due to their activism. [2] In 1966 after her husband Rev. Percy Murphy Griffin and his comrades organized a movement to integrate the Plaquemines Parish School system, Irene was right there on the battle field with him. Their mission on the Eastbank of Plaquemines Parish was to integrate the previous all white school, called Woodlawn. Nevertheless, they met opposite and protest from the whites who children attended the school. Twenty-seven black students where scheduled to attend Woodlawn high school after it opened it doors for the beginning of the school year. Unfortunately, some blacks jump the gun and took several black students to the school on the first day of opening. They met strong opposition from the white. Griffin and the remaining of the black students went to the school as scheduled on the 2nd day. Eventually the school was closed down. The Superintendent told Griffin to meet him at Phoenix High School on the following day. After he met with Griffin and other parents at Phoenix High, the superintendent informed them that they could send their kids to Belle Chasse High School on the westbank or leave them at Phoenix high. The scare tactics that the Superintendent used in his presentation, caused the parents of twenty-four black students to keep their children at Phoenix High. Mrs. Irene Griffin, under the guiding of her husband, allowed two of her sons to travel to Belle Chasse High School to partake in the movement.

Death

Irene Griffin died aged 84 in 2012. [2]

Further reading

The life of Percy Murphy Griffin : the struggles and victories of a black civil rights activist from Plaquemines Parish

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana</span> Parish in Louisiana, United States

Plaquemines Parish is a parish located in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 23,515 at the 2020 census, the parish seat is Pointe à la Hache and the largest community is Belle Chasse. The parish was formed in 1807.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jackson Parish, Louisiana</span> Parish in Louisiana, United States

Jackson Parish is a parish in the northern part of the U.S. state of Louisiana. As of the 2020 census, the population was 15,031. The parish seat is Jonesboro. The parish was formed in 1845 from parts of Claiborne, Ouachita, and Union Parishes. In the twentieth century, this part of the state had several small industrial mill towns, such as Jonesboro. East of Jonesboro is the Jimmie Davis State Park, which includes Caney Lake Reservoir.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Belle Chasse, Louisiana</span> Census-designated place in Louisiana, United States

Belle Chasse is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, United States, on the west bank of the Mississippi River. Belle Chasse is part of the Greater New Orleans metropolitan area. The population was 10,579 at the 2020 United States census. Belle Chasse is the largest community in Plaquemines Parish. It is home to Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base New Orleans, a Naval Air Station for the U.S. Navy Reserve.

The Deacons for Defense and Justice was an armed African-American self-defense group founded in November 1964, during the civil rights era in the United States, in the mill town of Jonesboro, Louisiana. On February 21, 1965—the day of Malcolm X's assassination—the first affiliated chapter was founded in Bogalusa, Louisiana, followed by a total of 20 other chapters in this state, Mississippi, Arkansas, and Alabama. It was intended to protect civil rights activists and their families, threatened both by white vigilantes and discriminatory treatment by police under Jim Crow laws. The Bogalusa chapter gained national attention during the summer of 1965 in its violent struggles with the Ku Klux Klan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Woodlawn, Chicago</span> Community area in Chicago

Woodlawn is a neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago, Illinois, located on and near the shore of Lake Michigan 8.5 miles (13.7 km) south of the Loop. It is one of the city's 77 municipally recognized community areas. It is bounded by the lake to the east, 60th Street to the north, King Drive to the west, and 67th Street to the south, save for a small tract that lies south of 67th Street between Cottage Grove Avenue and South Chicago Avenue. Local sources sometimes divide the neighborhood along Cottage Grove into "East" and "West Woodlawn."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leander Perez</span> American judge

Leander Henry Perez Sr. was an American Democratic Party political boss of Plaquemines and St. Bernard parishes in southeastern Louisiana during the middle third of the 20th century. Officially, he served as a district judge, later as district attorney, and as president of the Plaquemines Parish Commission Council. He was known for leading efforts to enforce and preserve segregation.

Plaquemine High School is a public high school located at 59595 Belleview Drive in unincorporated Iberville Parish, Louisiana, United States, south of the City of Plaquemine. It serves grades from seven to twelve and is administered by the Iberville Parish School Board.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Johnnie Carr</span> American civil rights leader (1911–2008)

Johnnie Rebecca Daniels Carr was a leader in the Civil Rights Movement in the United States from 1955 until her death.

Plaquemines Parish School Board (PPSB) is a school district headquartered in unincorporated Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base New Orleans</span> Census-designated place in Louisiana, United States

Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base New Orleans is a base of the United States military located in Belle Chasse, unincorporated Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, United States. NAS JRB New Orleans is home to a Navy Reserve aggressor squadron and a fleet logistics support squadron, the 159th Fighter Wing of the Louisiana Air National Guard, Coast Guard Air Station New Orleans, a detachment of a Marine Corps Reserve light helicopter attack squadron, as well as other US Navy and US Army activities. The base has a 24/7 operating schedule to support both the 159 FW's NORAD air sovereignty/homeland defense requirements and for Coast Guard Air Station New Orleans search and rescue/maritime law enforcement/port security missions. It contains a military airport known as Alvin Callender Field which is located three nautical miles (6 km) south of the central business district of New Orleans. The base's predecessor, NAS New Orleans, occupied the current location of the University of New Orleans's principal campus until 1957.

The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws introduced in the Southern United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries that enforced racial segregation, "Jim Crow" being a pejorative term for an African American. The last of the Jim Crow laws were generally overturned in 1965. Formal and informal racial segregation policies were present in other areas of the United States as well, even as several states outside the South had banned discrimination in public accommodations and voting. Southern laws were enacted by white-dominated state legislatures (Redeemers) to disenfranchise and remove political and economic gains made by African Americans during the Reconstruction era. Such continuing racial segregation was also supported by the successful Lily-white movement.

Belle Chasse High School (BCHS) is a grade 9–12 senior high school in Belle Chasse, an unincorporated area in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, United States. It is a part of the Plaquemines Parish School Board.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">School integration in the United States</span> Racial desegregation process

In the United States, school integration is the process of ending race-based segregation within American public and private schools. Racial segregation in schools existed throughout most of American history and remains an issue in contemporary education. During the Civil Rights Movement school integration became a priority, but since then de facto segregation has again become prevalent.

The history of the 1954 to 1968 American civil rights movement has been depicted and documented in film, song, theater, television, and the visual arts. These presentations add to and maintain cultural awareness and understanding of the goals, tactics, and accomplishments of the people who organized and participated in this nonviolent movement.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Willie Barrow</span> American civil rights activist and minister

Willie Beatrice Barrow was an American civil rights activist and minister. Barrow was the co-founder of Operation PUSH, which was named Operation Breadbasket at the time of its creation alongside Rev. Jesse Jackson. In 1984, Barrow became the first woman executive director of a civil rights organization, serving as Push's CEO. Barrow was the godmother of President Barack Obama.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frederick D. Reese</span> American civil rights activist

Frederick Douglas Reese was an American civil rights activist, educator and minister from Selma, Alabama. Known as a member of Selma's "Courageous Eight", Reese was the president of the Dallas County Voters League (DCVL) when it invited the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and Martin Luther King Jr. to Selma to amplify the city's local voting rights campaign. This campaign eventually gave birth to the Selma to Montgomery marches, which later led to the passage of the Voting Rights Act.

This is a timeline of the civil rights movement in the United States, a nonviolent mid-20th century freedom movement to gain legal equality and the enforcement of constitutional rights for people of color. The goals of the movement included securing equal protection under the law, ending legally institutionalized racial discrimination, and gaining equal access to public facilities, education reform, fair housing, and the ability to vote.

The Baton Rouge bus boycott was a boycott of city buses launched on June 19, 1953, by African-American residents of Baton Rouge, Louisiana who were seeking integration of the system. They made up about 80% of the ridership of the city buses in the early 1950s but, under Jim Crow rules, black people were forced to sit in the back of the bus, even when the front of the bus was empty. State laws prohibited black citizens from owning private buses outside the city systems.

Ralph Edwin King Jr., better known as Ed King, is a United Methodist minister, civil rights activist, and retired educator. He was a key figure in historic civil rights events taking place in Mississippi, including the Jackson Woolworth’s sit-in of 1963 and the Freedom Summer project in 1964. Rev. King held the position of chaplain and dean of students, 1963–1967, at Tougaloo College in Jackson, Mississippi. At this critical juncture of the civil rights movement, historian John Dittmer described King as “the most visible white activist in the Mississippi movement.”

References

  1. "Irene W. Griffin". Tributes. Retrieved December 22, 2019.
  2. 1 2 3 "Irene Griffin, first black woman to register to vote in Plaquemines Parish, dies at 84". New Orleans Times-Picayune. 30 March 2012. Retrieved 24 September 2019.
  3. The life of Percy Murphy Griffin : the struggles and victories of a black civil rights activist from Plaquemines Parish