Title: Congress of Racial Equality. Homer Chapter (La.): Records
Inclusive Dates: 1965-1966

Creator:

• Congress of Racial Equality. Homer Chapter (La.)

Call Number: Mss 84

Quantity: 0.2 c.f. (1 archives box)

Repository:

Wisconsin Historical Society, Division of Library, Archives, and Museum Collections

Archival Locations:

Wisconsin Historical Society (Map)

COLLECTION MAY BE STORED OFF-SITE: see catalog entry to request materials and for additional information.

Abstract:

Selected office files of the Homer, Louisiana, chapter of CORE including field reports, memoranda on employment conditions in Claiborne Parish, and material on the local Head Start project, public accommodations, a Black youth organization, and general community complaints.

Language: English

URL to cite for this finding aid: http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/wiarchives.uw-whs-mss00084

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In 1965 the Civic League of Homer, Louisiana, invited the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) to establish a chapter in Homer. The League had begun the attempt to upgrade the life of the Black community in Claiborne Parish, but found a need for the advice and experience of CORE. Once established, the Homer Chapter of CORE helped the League to strengthen itself internally by attracting new membership and electing new officers. The chapter helped structure such League projects as: a voter registration drive to get more Blacks on the voting rolls; a school desegregation suit; an anti-poverty program including a Head Start project for pre-school age children; and a Community Action program. Both the League and the chapter intended these specific programs to generally better the lives of the Claiborne Parish Blacks and to free them from further harrassment and intimidation from the White community. The only instance in which the chapter did not act in an advisory capacity to the League was in organizing youth groups.

The collection comprises ten folders from the Homer Chapter office, which has retained most of its office files. The folders in this collection, spanning 1965-1966, contain field reports from chapter representatives as well as reports on employment conditions for Blacks in the parish, general community complaints, the Head Start project, public accommodations, and Young Americans for Freedom (YAFF, a local Black youth group in no way connected to the national YAF). After the field reports, the files are arranged alphabetically by the titles used by the chapter office.

Acquisition Information

Presented by Richard Thomson, Homer, Louisiana, August 12, 1966. Accession Number: M66-300

Processing Information

Processed by Eleanor Niermann, June 15, 1970.

Box   1 Folder   1	Field Reports, 1965, June - Aug, Oct.
Box   1 Folder   2	Arrests, intimidations, and field reports, 1966, Jan. - July
Box   1 Folder   3	Employment, 1965
Box   1 Folder   4	Fliers, 1965, July; 1966, July
Box   1 Folder   5	General Community Complaints, 1965
Box   1 Folder   6	Head Start, 1965, May
Box   1 Folder   7	Public accommodations, 1965, May - June
Box   1 Folder   8	School Problems, 1965, May, July - Aug.
Box   1 Folder   9	War on Poverty, 1965, Aug.; 1966, March, Sept.
Box   1 Folder   10	Young Americans for Freedom, 1965, July - Aug.