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Debbie Green Civil Rights papers

 Collection
Identifier: MSN/MN 3013

Scope and Contents

Collection consists of a typescript memoir written by folk singer Debbie Green (1940-2017) about a 1965 trip from New York City to Amite County, Mississippi to assist with Civil Rights voter registration efforts. Green describes her travel to Amite with then boyfriend Eric Andersen (1943-), also a folk singer, and Village Voice columnist Jack Newfield (1938-2004). Once they arrive, Green details work with Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) representative E.W. Steptoe (1907-1983) to visit farms to register African American voters. Copies of letters to Green and Andersen relaying information about conditions in Mississippi constitute final 4 leaves of manuscript. Also included are newspaper clippings of an article Jack Newfield wrote about the Amite trip, and correspondence regarding possible publication of Debbie Green’s manuscript.

Dates

  • Creation: 1965 - 1971

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

The collection is open for research.

Conditions Governing Use

Copyright status for collection materials is unknown. Transmission or reproduction of materials protected by U.S. Copyright Law (Title 17, U.S.C.) beyond that allowed by fair use requires the written permission of the copyright owners. Works not in the public domain cannot be commercially exploited without permission of the copyright owners. Responsibility for any use rests exclusively with the user.

Biographical / Historical

Located in Southwest Mississippi, in the 1960s Amite was one of the state’s most impoverished counties. In 1960, there was not a single registered Black voter despite the fact that African American people made up more than half of the local population. The SNCC came to Amite County in 1961 after establishing a voter registration drive in nearby McComb. Early SNCC activists worked with local leaders E.W. Steptoe and Herbert Lee to register voters. Lee's murder in September of 1961 halted registration efforts until the SNCC returned to Amite in 1964 during the Freedom Summer campaign.

Biographical / Historical

Debbie Green was an American singer and musician born in New York. She was active and influential in the early folk music scenes in New York City, Boston and Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Berkeley, California. She was the first wife of Eric Andersen and the couple had one daughter.

Extent

.25 Cubic Feet (3 folders)

Language of Materials

English

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