Watch featured video clips from the interviews of each Kentucky Civil Rights Hall of Fame inductee.
Alan Anderson is the author of Confronting the Color Line which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. A minister and a professor, he was a pioneer in the Civil Rights Movement starting in Chicago in the 1950s. He was head of the department of Philosphy and Religion at Western Kentucky University. He was arrested in 1962 in Albany, GA and he was in charge of Dr. King’s visit to Chicago in 1965.
Alan Anderson
Beverly Watts is the Executive Director of the Tennessee Commission on Human Rights. In her position as Director of the Kentucky Commission on Human Rights, she initiated the Kentucky Civil Rights Hall of Fame.
Beverly Watts
Charles Neblett is a civil rights activist and founding member of The Freedom Singers.
Charles Neblett
Dolores Delahanty is a social activist and political leader in Louisville, Kentucky. She was a founding member of the National Women’s Political Caucus during the early Civil Rights Movement, and she was critical to the success of Kentucky’s Fair Credit Law. Delahanty has devoted her life to improving the lives of others, primarily those of Kentucky women and children. Her leadership roles include serving as secretary of the Kentucky Governor’s Commission on Women, Executive Director of the Jefferson County Department for Human Services and as a Distict County Commissioner in Jefferson County.
Dolores Delahanty
Edgardo Mansilla was born in Argentina in 1953. He is the executive director of the Americana Community Center in Louisville, Kentucky.
Edgardo Mansilla
Georgia Davis Powers was born in Springfield, Kentucky in 1933. She is a politician and civil rights activist and served as a distinguished member of the Kentucky State Senate for 21 years, starting in 1967. She was with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis when Dr. King was assassinated in 1968.
Georgia Davis Powers
John Johnson was born in Franklin, Kentucky and is the Executive Director of the Kentucky Commission on Human Rights. He served for twenty years as an official of the NAACP at their national headquarters in Baltimore, Maryland.
John Johnson
Merlene Davis graduated from the University of Kentucky with a Journalism degree. She went to the University of California, Berkeley, through the Maynard Institute and worked as a journalist in Memphis Tennessee before returning to the Lexington Herald-Leader. She was a columnist at the Lexington Herald-Leader from 1985 until her retirement in 2015. She is an inductee into the Kentucky Civil Rights Hall of Fame.
Merlene Davis
Father Patrick Delahanty is a priest and human rights advocate from Louisville, Kentucky.
Patrick Delahanty
P.G. Peeples began his career at the Urban League of Lexington soon after graduating from the University of Kentucky, in 1968. His tenure began as education director and he is now president and CEO of the Urban League of Lexington/Fayette County. He also serves as Chairman of the Kentucky Community and Technical College Board.
PG Peeples
Raoul Cunningham was born in 1943 and began working for civil rights at age 14. Cunningham recruited other young people to the cause and, after careful planning, they began picketing numerous downtown Louisville lunch counters and restaurants that refused to serve African-Americans. He attended Howard University.
Raoul Cunningham
Rev. Dr. Charles Elliott Jr. was born in Wheeler, Alabama in 1934. He is the pastor of King Solomon Missionary Baptist Church in Louisville, Kentucky. He was inducted into the Kentucky Civil Rights Hall of Fame in 2012.
Rev. Dr. Charles Elliott Jr.
Roszalyn Akins is the First Lady of the First Baptist Church of Bracktown. She started the Carter G. Woodson Academy for young men and taught for 30+ years at Leestown Middle School in Lexington, KY.
Roszalyn Akins
Suzy Post was born in 1933 and is a Civil Rights Activist living in Louisville, Kentucky. She served as President of what is now the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky and sat on the Board of Directors of the American Civil Liberties Union.
Suzy Post
William F. McMurry is a professional liability attorney practicing in Kentucky. He settled a class action for 243 survivors of priest sexual abuse. He later sued the Vatican, resulting in the first Federal Court ruling holding the Vatican accountable for the failure of Bishops to report childhood sexual abuse to authorities.