The Ferriday Freedom Movement (FFM) was founded on July 27, 1965 as a local affiliate of
the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). A group of Ferriday, Louisiana, residents and CORE
workers organized the FFM as a response to attempts by the white community, and especially
by the Ku Klux Klan, to interfere with a voter registration drive among the black
population.
The FFM was closely tied with the Southern Regional Office of CORE, and, with CORE's
assistance, extended the scope of its activities beyond the original voter registration
drive. Under the leadership of Ronnie Moore, field secretary for CORE in Louisiana, the
group picketed and boycotted merchants who refused to hire blacks, tested restaurants and a
drugstore lunch counter, integrated the town library, demonstrated at a segregated movie
theater, and held a march to the city hall to protest police brutality.
Attempts at intimidation, including the bombing of the home of FFM president Robert Lewis,
failed to stop the Movement. Members also participated in civil rights activities in
Shreveport (Caddo Parish) and Tallulah (Madison Parish), Louisiana. On November 30, 1965,
the FFM initiated a successful suit for integration of the local schools, despite abuse
suffered by black students attending the integrated school.
