Stories From the Voting Rights Fight

Civil Rights Veteran Maria Gitin, former Watsonville resident and nationally known author and speaker, will share images and stories from the grassroots activists of rural Alabama in the 1965 struggle for voting rights as part of Pajaro Valley Arts "Vote! Your Voice is Your Vote" exhibit. As a college freshman, Gitin volunteered to register African American voters during the little known violent summer prior to President Johnson signing the Voting Rights Act. A freshman at San Francisco State College, Gitin felt called to action after witnessing violent state troopers attack peaceful voting rights demonstrators in Selma, Alabama. After training in Atlanta, from dignitaries including Martin Luther King Jr. himself, she was assigned to rural Wilcox County where the Black citizens were attacked, fired and arrested for simply attempting to register to vote. Gitin spent the summer working and walking with courageous local Black activists and sometimes running from the Ku Klux Klan. Her memoir of that summer, “This Bright Light of Ours: Stories from the Voting Rights Fight” was published by University of Alabama Press in 2014. Since that time, Gitin has presented more than fifty times including as keynote speaker for the US Army Presidio of Monterey, King County Washington, the National Park Service in Selma and Emory University. This is her first presentation in Watsonville. For more information about Gitin and “This Bright Light of Ours” https://www.thisbrightlightofours.com

Signed copies of “This Bright Light of Ours: Stories from the Voting Rights Fight” will be available for sale with proceeds to Pajaro Valley Arts.