1959 – Anderson and Civil Rights at Woodland
In December 1955 - a year after the U.S. Supreme Court, in Brown v Board of Education, struck down numerous “Jim Crow” laws, which permitted racial segregation and discrimination - Rosa Parks was arrested on a Montgomery Alabama city bus for refusing to relinquish her seat to a white person. Her arrest precipitated the Montgomery Bus Boycott and launched the first major civil rights campaign in half a century - and the first major address of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
In his speech to nearly 5,000 people at the Holt Street Baptist Church in Montgomery, King urged the audience to continue their campaign until they achieve “justice on the buses.” “[W]e are not wrong in what we are doing,” King said. “If we are wrong, the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. If we are wrong, the Constitution of the United States is wrong. If we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong. If we are wrong, Jesus of Nazareth was merely a utopian dreamer that never came down to earth. If we are wrong, justice is a lie. Love has no meaning. And we are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until justice runs down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
The Congress on Racial Equality had been fighting injustices since 1942, with the stated mission "to bring about equality for all people regardless of race, creed, sex, age, disability, sexual orientation, religion or ethnic background." This was a seen as a very radical proposition at the time. During the Freedom rides, CORE members were arrested and jailed several times, but they received a great deal of publicity, prompting a long series of similar campaigns.
Donald Anderson joined CORE in 1954 and brought with him to Lexington a passion for social justice work. From 1957 to 1960, he served as minister of Woodland Christian Church, and according to his obituary he participated in marches and sit-ins while at Woodland.
Using the best available survey data from that time, a Cambridge study on Civil Rights, World War II, and U.S. Public Opinion found that after the war, for whites in the mass public, while there is some evidence of liberalization on issues of racial prejudice, this generally does not extend to policies addressing racial inequities. In other words, most whites were not yet ready to act on their impulse toward racial liberalization, and there is little evidence to suggest that in 1959 Woodland members were substantially different.
At the same time, there was a need for a new congregation on the south side of Lexington in the Glendover area. Christian Church members throughout Lexington were asked to consider “seeding” the congregation by joining the new Crestwood Christian Church. Eleven Woodland families answered the call, and with a pledge of $3,000 from Woodland, 144 members gathered at the Glendover School in February to share communion in the first worship service. It is unclear, but some people may not have been comfortable with Anderson’s prophetic preaching on race relations. His ministry was short, and as Nancy Jo Kemper recalls, there were “difficult moments when I think some of the leaders wanted to fire him for being too radical.” By May of 1960, Pastor Anderson submitted his resignation, and began work on his Ph. D. in social ethics at the University of Chicago achieving his Masters in 1962, and his doctorate in 1964.
Minister of Education Don Scott stayed for two more years after Anderson left. They had, in many ways, been co-pastors, with Anderson preaching and Don Scott in charge of the Sunday School and the youth ministry. Kemper says, “He was a barrel of fun and the youth loved him.” He had us dancing in the church, much to the chagrin of the people who had complained when Hayes Farish allowed the youth to dance on the retreats he led.
Sadly, Don Scott’s last days must have been difficult. After fathering two daughters in what appeared to be a solid marriage, he came out as gay, divorced, and left to enter the Hartford Theological Seminary. Public scorn of homosexuality was on par with the racial antipathy of the time.
Jesus’s admonition to love our neighbors as ourselves can seem almost simplistic. But it has proven to be an attitude that is quite difficult to achieve on a broad scale.
Martin Luther King Jr. recalled Jesus’s “greatest commandment” when told his Alabama listeners, “I’ve never been on a bus in Montgomery. But I would be less than a Christian if I stood back and said, because I don’t ride the bus, I don’t have to ride a bus, that it doesn’t concern me. I will not be content. I can hear a voice saying, “If you do it unto the least of these, my brother, you do it unto me.”
In his speech to nearly 5,000 people at the Holt Street Baptist Church in Montgomery, King urged the audience to continue their campaign until they achieve “justice on the buses.” “[W]e are not wrong in what we are doing,” King said. “If we are wrong, the Supreme Court of this nation is wrong. If we are wrong, the Constitution of the United States is wrong. If we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong. If we are wrong, Jesus of Nazareth was merely a utopian dreamer that never came down to earth. If we are wrong, justice is a lie. Love has no meaning. And we are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until justice runs down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
The Congress on Racial Equality had been fighting injustices since 1942, with the stated mission "to bring about equality for all people regardless of race, creed, sex, age, disability, sexual orientation, religion or ethnic background." This was a seen as a very radical proposition at the time. During the Freedom rides, CORE members were arrested and jailed several times, but they received a great deal of publicity, prompting a long series of similar campaigns.
Donald Anderson joined CORE in 1954 and brought with him to Lexington a passion for social justice work. From 1957 to 1960, he served as minister of Woodland Christian Church, and according to his obituary he participated in marches and sit-ins while at Woodland.
Using the best available survey data from that time, a Cambridge study on Civil Rights, World War II, and U.S. Public Opinion found that after the war, for whites in the mass public, while there is some evidence of liberalization on issues of racial prejudice, this generally does not extend to policies addressing racial inequities. In other words, most whites were not yet ready to act on their impulse toward racial liberalization, and there is little evidence to suggest that in 1959 Woodland members were substantially different.
At the same time, there was a need for a new congregation on the south side of Lexington in the Glendover area. Christian Church members throughout Lexington were asked to consider “seeding” the congregation by joining the new Crestwood Christian Church. Eleven Woodland families answered the call, and with a pledge of $3,000 from Woodland, 144 members gathered at the Glendover School in February to share communion in the first worship service. It is unclear, but some people may not have been comfortable with Anderson’s prophetic preaching on race relations. His ministry was short, and as Nancy Jo Kemper recalls, there were “difficult moments when I think some of the leaders wanted to fire him for being too radical.” By May of 1960, Pastor Anderson submitted his resignation, and began work on his Ph. D. in social ethics at the University of Chicago achieving his Masters in 1962, and his doctorate in 1964.
Minister of Education Don Scott stayed for two more years after Anderson left. They had, in many ways, been co-pastors, with Anderson preaching and Don Scott in charge of the Sunday School and the youth ministry. Kemper says, “He was a barrel of fun and the youth loved him.” He had us dancing in the church, much to the chagrin of the people who had complained when Hayes Farish allowed the youth to dance on the retreats he led.
Sadly, Don Scott’s last days must have been difficult. After fathering two daughters in what appeared to be a solid marriage, he came out as gay, divorced, and left to enter the Hartford Theological Seminary. Public scorn of homosexuality was on par with the racial antipathy of the time.
Jesus’s admonition to love our neighbors as ourselves can seem almost simplistic. But it has proven to be an attitude that is quite difficult to achieve on a broad scale.
Martin Luther King Jr. recalled Jesus’s “greatest commandment” when told his Alabama listeners, “I’ve never been on a bus in Montgomery. But I would be less than a Christian if I stood back and said, because I don’t ride the bus, I don’t have to ride a bus, that it doesn’t concern me. I will not be content. I can hear a voice saying, “If you do it unto the least of these, my brother, you do it unto me.”