About Us

The Atlanta Student Movement Project is a research project funded by a generous grant from the Rich Foundation, conducted by Kennesaw State University undergraduate and graduate students, and led by Dr. Jeanne Law Bohannon (KSU English Department) along with Dr. Lonnie King, the project's senior community partner. The oral histories in this collection represent the goal of the project: uncovering and preserving the history of Atlanta sit-ins and student protests that were pivotal in the success of the Student Movement, the Civil Rights movement, and the history of the city of Atlanta as a whole. Videos and transcripts in this collection have been archived at the KSU Archives.

Formed early in 1960, the Atlanta Student Movement was one part of the larger Civil Rights Movement. The group was comprised of students from university campuses that were part of the Atlanta University Center (AUC), a consortium of higher education centers for African-Americans that included Atlanta University, Clark College, Interdenominational Theological Center, Morehouse College, Morris Brown, and Spelman College.

Atlanta Student Movement leaders, participants, and advocates include the following people, whose stories from the Movement project participants plan to record and make available in this collection:

Herschelle Sullivan Challenor (Spelman); Norma June Wilson Davis (Spelman); Marion Wright Edleman (Spelman); Marilyn Pryce Hoyt (Spelman); Gwendolyn Middlebrooks (Spelman); Roslyn Pope (Spelman); Annie Ruth Simmons (Clark); Lenora Taitt (Spelman); Eva Kendrick Wollert (Clark); Birdie Hix Carter; Charles Black (Morehouse); Morris Dillard (Morehouse); James Felder (Clark); Frank Holloway (Morehouse); John Mack (Atlanta University); Otis Moss (ITC); Johnny Parham (Morehouse); Joseph Pegues (Morehouse); and Frank Smith (Morehouse).

The students also depended on advocates such as Sarah Stevens, Senator LeRoy and Cleopatra Johnson, and many others in communities both local and nationwide.

The digital reproductions on this site are provided for research consultation and educational purposes. To request permission to publish, reproduce, publicly display, broadcast, or distribute this material in any format outside of fair use, please contact the Kennesaw State University Archives.

News
In 2017, students from the School of Communication developed a video for their senior capstone that describes the public humanities work of the #ATLStudentmovement Project. View the video: Voices of the Young: The #ATLStudentmovement Project.

Have a story about the Atlanta Student Movement that you want to share? We want to include it in our project!

Contact: Jeanne Law Bohannon
Email: jbohan12@kennesaw.edu
Phone: 470-578-7380