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Title on Reel (transcribed from original)
Poor Peoples [sic] March, Saturday, May 18, 1968, North end of Lee Bridge by the War Memorial
Date Created
1968-05-18
Reel Format
Super 8mm
Reel Description
This reel contains footage of the Poor People's Campaign Caravan crossing over the Robert E. Lee Memorial Bridge in Richmond, likely filmed from the Virginia War Memorial. Most are wearing day clothes, some are dressed in religious wear, and many holding signs. This appears to be a group of majority Black participants, with uniformed police officers appearing to be majority white.
Timestamp Description
00:00:09 Footage begins. An individual stands with their arms resting on a car, and lays their head on their arms.
00:00:12 Footage of individuals sitting on car hoods and standing around the cars.
00:00:13 Footage of a car with a red cross/medic symbol on a piece of paper in the window sitting on the street in front of a building reading "Manchester Mills Feeds & Seeds" in the background. Cars and individuals are seen in the parking lot between the Manchester Mills building and the medic car. Footage pans left to film more cars and people. An individual wearing a marshal jacket and red bandana is visible speaking with an individual with a photography camera around their neck. Footage zooms in on the marshal.
00:00:19 Footage of two individuals sitting on the hood of a car, with approximately a dozen individuals standing in the background.
00:00:21 Zoomed in footage of the rear license plate of a car as it drives.
00:00:23 Footage of the march. Three police cars are ahead of the march, followed by four uniformed officers on horseback. A Miller & Rhoads bus is visible on the left hand side of the march.
00:01:01 Footage zooms in on the marchers, many of whom wear red armbands on their left upper arms. An individual using a wheelchair is visible in the crowd. Some in the crowd hold walkie talkies with antennas raised. An individual using a white cane, used by individuals who are blind or visually impaired, is visible. A photographer crosses in front of the crowd from right to left.
00:01:10 An individual holds a fist salute up in the direction of the camera. The individual filming zooms in and out of the crowd as marchers walk. Many individuals wear paper tags on their shirts with red circles drawn on them. Uniformed police officers are seen walking on the right edge of the march very few feet.
00:01:52 The march continues, an individual holding a sign is visible, it reads: "Open Doors of Opportunity for Black People".
00:02:16 An individual passes the camera and sticks their tongue out at it.
00:02:40 A building with "Texaco" written on it is visible across the street from the marchers. There also appears to be a crowd of onlookers standing in the Texaco parking lot.
00:02:44 The marchers dwindle, and are followed by three uniformed officers on police trikes.
00:02:47 The angle of filming switches, not filming the march as it walks away.
00:02:55 The camera has returned to the previous position and films the caravan portion of the march, beginning with a car with someone riding on the hood, then followed by a bus with a sign in the window: "Urgent CBS News". The camera zooms in on the license plate.
00:03:07 Footage ends.
Event Description
The Poor People's Campaign occurred between May 12 and June 24 1968. Suggested to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. by NAACP director Marion Wright, the campaign sought to bring poor and working class people to Washington, D.C. to demand "jobs, unemployment insurance, a fair minimum wage, and education for poor adults and children designed to improve their self-image and self-esteem" from the government. After Dr. King's assassination on April 4, 1968, Ralph Abernathy succeeded King as president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and continued plans for the campaign. The first official date of the campaign was May 12, Mother's Day, when Coretta Scott King and thousands of women demonstrated in D.C. The next day, Resurrection City was established on the National Mall. According to a flier from the Civil Rights Movement Archive, a southern caravan to Washington D.C. began in Edwards, Mississippi, on May 5th. It arrived in Richmond on May 18. The Richmond Times-Dispatch reported on May 19 that the 13-bus, 450-person caravan traveled from Norfolk, with the number growing to 800 people upon arrival in Richmond. At 4PM on May 18, the caravan arrived in an unidentified vacant lot in Southside, where remarks from SCLC officials were given, snacks passed around, and the crowd marched north over the Robert E. Lee Memorial Bridge, surrounded by a large police presence. The march grew, perhaps to around 2,000 people, and went to Presbyterian School of Christian Education, now Union Presbyterian Seminary, on Brook Road in the Northside neighborhood, where dinner was served. Hosea Williams, field director of SCLC, spoke to a remaining 1,000 individuals at 10:55PM. Marchers spent the night at Virginia Union University, Union Theological Seminary, and in private homes. Read more about the Poor People's Campaign via the Stanford University Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute and the National Museum of African American History & Culture.
Runtime
00:03:53
Personal Name Subject
King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968; Abernathy, Ralph, 1926-1990; Williams, Hosea, 1926-2000
Corporate Name Subject
Virginia Union University (Richmond, Va.); Union Theological Seminary and Presbyterian School of Christian Education; Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (U.S.)
Topical Subject
Poor People's Campaign; Anti-poverty movements; Demonstrations; Crowds; Processions; Motorcades; Public welfare; Welfare rights movement; "Civil rights movements; Civil rights movements--United States; Civil rights demonstrations; Civil rights workers; Mounted police; Police horses; Animals in police work; Police; Police patrol--Surveillance operations; Electronic surveillance; Video surveillance
City/Location
Richmond (Va.)
Genre
color films (visual works)
Local Genre
moving image
Type
Moving Image
Digital Format
video/mp4
Language
eng
Rights Statement URL
Rights
This material is in the public domain in the United States and thus is free of any copyright restriction. Acknowledgement of Virginia Commonwealth University Libraries as a source is requested.
Collection
Richmond Police Department Surveillance Collection
Source
Poor People's Campaign Caravan in Richmond Film Reel #05, 1968 May 18
File Name
VCU_M571_079.mp4