As marches proliferated in the Jim Crow South during the 1960s, movements also gathered in the North, protesting segregated housing and unequal treatment of Black Americans. In Milwaukee, a priest named Father Groppi—after witnessing the maltreatment of Black Milwaukeeans throughout his youth and adulthood—decided to use his position in church leadership to aid the efforts of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) to achieve fair housing.
United States
James Farmer: Co-Founder of CORE
James Farmer was “one of the major leaders of the African American freedom struggle.”
State Street Starbucks: Employees Push for Action
The State & Lake Starbucks location has been a staple in Madison since the late 1990s, however this hub of student activity has become a beacon of unionization in the recent months as students have arrived back on campus.
Teaching History as an Act of Nonviolent Protest: SNCC’s Freedom Schools and History Curriculum
This article was written by Axell Boomer and was awarded the Civil Resistance Prize by the History Department in 2024. It was originally written for the Nonviolence Project: As systemic inequalities—which arrived from the institution of American slavery—manifested themselves into the classroom, Black students were left with less federal support than White students in the American South. Black students in Mississippi, despite comprising fifty-seven percent of “school-aged children,” received “only thirteen percent of state funds.”
Living in a 1000 Year Old Tree: Julia Butterfly Hill during California’s Redwood Timber Wars
On December 10, 1997, Julia ‘Butterfly’ Hill at 24 years old, climbed Luna, an over 1000-year-old, giant redwood tree, and would not touch ground for the next two years and eight days.
Unions and Strikes in Hollywood
The 2023 Screen Actors Guild–American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) and Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike started on May 2nd, 2023 and lasted until just recently, when the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) agreed to negotiate with union leaders’ and workers’ demands, on September 27th, 2023.
Barrier Breakers – Mercile Lee
One of the most impactful methods of nonviolent activism at UW-Madison can be found in scholarships, the Chancellor Scholarship and Powers-Knapp Scholarship, now known as the Mercile Lee Scholars Program. This program, named after Mercile Lee, a lifelong advocate for Civil Rights and racial equality, aims “to attract, support and develop the abilities and potential of academically talented and outstanding individuals from underrepresented groups.”
Barrier Breakers – Remembering Ada Deer
Earlier this month, on August 15th, the esteemed Menominee leader Ada Deer passed away. Her impact on Native communities across the nation, as well as her influence at UW-Madison, was enormous and serves as inspiration to all who hear her story.
America Bracho – Sharing Our Fire
This oral history interview was conducted by Gabe Sanders with America Bracho, a lifelong community organizer and has founded several health programs for Latinos across the country.
The Gay Purges – A Brief History of Exclusion and Resilience
The term Gay Purge is in reference to when UW-Madison “actively purged students identified as homosexuals” in 1962. However, the persecution of LGBTQ+ students at UW-Madison predated the 1960s.