Mr. Jones

One person involved in the Civil Rights movement that I didn’t know about before this trip is

Roscoe Jones. Roscoe Jones was a young man during the Civil Rights movement who was involved

with SNCC. He helped to register voters in the south, to gather attention for

Freedom Schools in Mississippi, and to organize and lead various other programs and protests.

During what was known as the Freedom Summer in Mississippi, 3 Civil Rights activists were

traveling down to Mississippi when they were murdered by klansmen.

Roscoe Jones was supposed to be the 4th member of the group,

but he had an important engagement that came up right

before the group was about to leave and so he couldn’t go.

The tragic story of these activists became widely known, and drew attention to conditions in Mississippi.

Mr. Jones’ story was really interesting to me, and it made me realize that there are

so many heroes of the Civil Rights movement that many don’t know about.

Mr. Jones’ story was so closely connected to a tragic one that everyone knows about,

and yet not many have heard his own name and story. I

think the unknown stories of the Civil Rights Movement are just as important as the known ones.

I think people need to allow themselves to be open to learning about the past even if it’s difficult.

I think we need to change the way we teach American history in school.

I personally am learning so much more than what I was taught about the

Civil Rights movement in school, and I wish that our history classes would be

changed to contain other important parts of American history. What more do I want to learn?

Well, I don’t know for sure but I want to continue visiting these Civil Rights museums and sites,

and I want to focus on paying attention to names I haven’t heard before as opposed to the ones I have.