Nashville remembers civil rights icon John Lewis with annual march
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A Nashville mural honoring John Lewis. Photo: Joe Sohm/Visions of America/Universal Images Group via Getty Images
Civil rights icon John Lewis died five years ago this week, but his example continues to inspire the kind of "good trouble" he championed as an activist and congressman.
Zoom in: Nashville played an outsize role in Lewis' life, and in the history of the Civil Rights Movement. Activists here are planning to commemorate Lewis' memory by retracing his steps.
- A march this Saturday will move from Jefferson Street into the heart of downtown, where Lewis participated in historic protests that changed Nashville and brought national attention to the racist policies of the Jim Crow South.
- The route follows Fifth Avenue North, which has been renamed Rep. John Lewis Way.
Flashback: Lewis arrived in Nashville as a college student in the late 1950s. He studied at the American Baptist Theological Seminary (now American Baptist College) and Fisk University.
- Along the way, he began to train for nonviolent protests against segregation.
Lewis became a leader of the student-driven movement to desegregate Nashville's downtown lunch counters.
- During a 1960 sit-in at a Fifth Avenue lunch counter, employees sprayed Lewis with water and used a fumigation machine to try to drive him from his seat. He stayed, covering his mouth with a handkerchief as fumes filled the room.
- At a later sit-in down the street, Lewis wrote a sermon at the counter as police closed in to arrest him.
Zoom out: Working in Nashville prepared Lewis to lead marchers across the bridge in Selma, to speak at the March on Washington, to participate in the Freedom Rides and to walk the halls of Congress.
- "It's here in this city ... where I really grew up," Lewis said of Nashville during a visit in 2016. "I owe it all to this city, and the academic community, and to the religious community here."
Between the lines: Nashville has taken intentional steps to embrace and elevate its long-overlooked role in the Civil Rights Movement, including by renaming part of Fifth Avenue to honor Lewis.
- The plaza outside of the Historic Metro Courthouse has been renamed after Diane Nash, who protested alongside Lewis.
If you go: The march is set to begin at 8am Saturday at the corner of Jefferson Street and Rep. John Lewis Way.