West VirginiaUniversity will commemorate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day with an evening presentation by noted activist and speaker Minnijean Brown Trickey at 7 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 16, at the SpruceStreetUnitedMethodistChurch. A Unity Breakfast is set for Monday, Jan. 20, the day marked as a national holiday honoring Dr. King.
Trickey, was one of nine students to make history by walking into CentralHigh School in Little Rock, Ark., in September 1957. The students, who came to be known as”The Little Rock Nine,”were all black and were the first group to test the 1954 ban on school segregation in the United States.
When in her 20s, Trickey and her husband, Roy, supported the non-violence movement for civil rights and for peace. When her husbands petition to be listed as a conscientious objector was denied and he was instead drafted for service in Vietnam, the couple moved to Canada.
While living in northern Ontario, she learned to raise animals, farmed the land by hand and home-schooled her six children. After 25 years in Canada, Trickey returned to the United States, where she and other members of the”Little Rock Nine”received the Congressional Gold Medal from President Bill Clinton in 1999.
Trickeys life of activism has been chronicled in a documentary, Journey to Little Rock: The Untold Story of Minnijean Brown Trickey . For more information on the documentary, go towww.journeytolittlerock.com.
“The WVU Center for Black Culture and Research is honored to assist in the coordination of the annual Martin Luther King Jr. programs for the University and the City of Morgantown,”said Dr. Katherine Bankole, director of the CBC &R.”These events represent our community coming together to reflect on the social justice legacy of Dr. King’s life and work, and they help to propel us forward in our commitment to racial justice and equality.”
The 13th annual Unity Breakfast, featuring the presentations of the 2003 MLK Achievement Award and the 2003 MLK Scholarship, is scheduled for Monday, Jan. 20, at 8 a.m. in the Mountainlair Ballrooms. Otis Cox, WVU Public Safety program coordinator, will speak at the event. Both commemoration events are free and open to the public; however, advanced reservations are required for the breakfast, which is sponsored by the WVU Presidents Office. To make reservations, or for more information, call the CBC &R at 304-293-7029, ext. 110. In case of inclement weather, the breakfast will be held on Monday, Jan. 27. (The alternate date is incorrect on invitations that were mailed.)