Myrlie Evers-Williams

Myrlie Louise Evers-Williams (née Beasley; born March 17, 1933) is an American civil rights activist and journalist who worked for over three decades to seek justice for the 1963 murder of her husband Medgar Evers, another civil rights activist.

She also served as chairwoman of the NAACP, and published several books on topics related to civil rights and her husband's legacy.

Evers-Williams was born Myrlie Louise Beasley on March 17, 1933, in her maternal grandmother's home in Vicksburg, Mississippi.

She was the daughter of James Van Dyke Beasley, a delivery man, and Mildred Washington Beasley, who was 16 years old.

Myrlie's parents separated when she was just a year old; her mother left Vicksburg but decided that Myrlie was too young to travel with her.

Since her maternal grandmother worked all day in service, with no time to raise a child, Myrlie was raised by her paternal grandmother, Annie McCain Beasley, and an aunt, Myrlie Beasley Polk.

Both women were respected school teachers and they inspired her to follow in their footsteps.

Myrlie attended the Magnolia school, took piano lessons, and performed songs, piano pieces or recited poetry at school, in church, and at local clubs.

Myrlie graduated from Magnolia High School (Bowman High School) in 1950.

During her years in high school, Myrlie was also a member of the Chansonettes, a girls’ vocal group from Mount Heroden Baptist Church in Vicksburg.

In 1950, Myrlie enrolled at Alcorn A&M College, one of the few colleges in the state that accepted African American students, as an education major intending to minor in music.

Myrlie is also a member of Delta Sigma Theta sorority.

On her first day of school Myrlie met and fell in love with Medgar Evers, a World War II veteran eight years her senior.

The meeting changed her college plans, and the couple later married on Christmas Eve of 1951.

They later moved to Mound Bayou, where they had their first child, Darrell Kenyatta, named for the imprisoned African leader, Jomo Kenyatta.

In Mound Bayou, Myrlie worked as a secretary at the Magnolia Mutual Life Insurance Company.

Domestic life was strained by her husband's formal application to law school as his parents were opposed, Myrlie was expecting her second child, the family was financially restricted and unprepared for the increasing public exposure on his stealthy voting rights activities in the Delta.

Reena Denise was born Sept. 13, 1954 as Medgar was establishing the NAACP in the Delta.

When Medgar Evers became the Mississippi field secretary for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1954, Myrlie worked alongside him.

Myrlie became his secretary and together they organized voter registration drives and civil rights demonstrations.

She assisted him as he struggled to end the practice of racial segregation in schools and other public facilities and as he campaigned for voting rights many African Americans were denied this right in the South.

For more than a decade, the Everses fought for voting rights, equal access to public accommodations, the desegregation of the University of Mississippi, and for equal rights in general for Mississippi's African American population.

As prominent civil rights leaders in Mississippi, the Everses became high-profile targets for pro-segregationist violence and terrorism.

In 1962, their home in Jackson, Mississippi, was firebombed in reaction to an organized boycott of downtown Jackson's white merchants.

The family had been threatened, and Evers targeted by the Ku Klux Klan.

In 1964, a year before Byron de la Beckwith's release, she moved with her children to Claremont, California, and emerged as a civil rights activist in her own right.

She earned her Bachelor of Arts in sociology from Pomona College.

She spoke on behalf of the NAACP and in 1967 she co-wrote For Us, the Living, which chronicled her late husband's life and work.

She also made two unsuccessful bids for U.S. Congress.

From 1968 to 1970, Evers was the director of planning at the center for Educational Opportunity for the Claremont Colleges.

From 1973 to 1975, Evers was the vice-president for advertising and publicity at the New-York-based advertising firm Seligman and Lapz.

In 1975, she moved to Los Angeles to become the national director for community affairs for the Atlantic Richfield Company (ARCO).

At ARCO she was responsible for developing and managing all the corporate programs.

This included overseeing funding for community projects, outreach programs, public and private partnership programs and staff development.

She helped secure money for many organizations such as the National Woman's Educational Fund, and worked with a group that provided meals to the poor and homeless.

Myrlie Evers-Williams continued to explore ways to serve her community and to work with the NAACP.

Los Angeles mayor Tom Bradley appointed her to the Board of Public Works as a commissioner in 1987.

Evers-Williams was the first black woman to serve as a commissioner on the board, a position she held for 8 years.

Evers-Williams also joined the board of the NAACP.

On January 21, 2013, she delivered the invocation at the second inauguration of Barack Obama.