Fannie Lou Hamer was a leader in the Civil Rights Movement, women's rights activist, and a community organizer. Fannie Lou Hamer (formerly Townsend) was born on October 6, 1917 in Montgomery County, Mississippi. She was the youngest child of twenty children. Fannie joined her parents in working the fields at age six. She later marries Perry “Pap” Hamer in 1944. The couple were both sharecroppers in Ruleville, Mississippi. Fannie and Pap Hamer adopted two girls due to Fannie’s own pregnancies ending in miscarriages. In 1961, Hamer was given a hysterectomy without her consent when she went to a Sunflower County hospital for a minor uterine surgery. This illegal procedure was also known in the area as a “Mississippi appendectomy.”
In the summer …show more content…
She organized voter registration initiatives and relief efforts although her affiliation with the Civil Rights Movement often put her in danger. She was threatened, arrested, beaten and shot at on several occassions. In 1963, she and other 4 female activists were arrested in a Winona, Mississippi, jail. She was beaten by black male prisoners at the order of white officers, and she ended up suffering permanent kidney damage. She also endured molestation from a white male officer. In 1964, Hamer helped to create the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP), which was in direct opposition to Mississippi’s all-white delegation at the Democratic Convention. It was there that she also announced her candidacy for Congress. Although she was unsuccessful in her run for congress, she brought national attention to the civil rights struggle in Mississippi during a televised gathering at the convention. In addition to her focus on voter registration, she helped create organizations to increase business opportunities for communities of color and to provide childcare and other family related services. She also helped to establish National Women's Political Caucus in 1971. Just five years later, Fannie Hamer would be diagnosed with breast cancer. Despite her illness, Hamer continued to fight for civil rights. On March 14, 1977, she died in a