YOUNGSTOWN — The next move for the local students who went on a recent civil rights bus journey through the South will be to read portions of the “Letter from Birmingham Jail” beginning at noon April 17 in the Mahoning County Courthouse rotunda.

The occasion will mark the 60th anniversary of the famous document.

Twenty-seven students, religious leaders, activists and others are scheduled to read aloud parts of the letter. Among them will be Janice W. Kelsey of Birmingham, who took part in the May 1963 Children’s March to desegregate the city and was one of more than 4,100 children arrested.

Mahoning Valley Sojourn to the Past is sponsoring the gathering, Penny Wells, executive director, noted.

Kelsey also is planning to speak that day at the YWCA Mahoning Valley. To make a reservation, call Michaela Write at 330-746-6361.

IMPACTFUL VISIT

Which aspects of their sojourn most affected area high school students who had taken part? It depends on whom you ask.

“It pulled on my heartstrings,” Katherine Abrego, 17, a Chaney High student, said last week at her school as she and a few of her peers who also had gone gathered to practice reading parts of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous “Letter from Birmingham Jail.”

She was referring to having met family members of the late Vernon F. Dahmer Sr. His wife, Ellie, 97, and two of his eight children, Dennis and Bettie Dahmer, spoke to the group of local students and adults who participated in the recent eight-day Sojourn to the Past trip to key civil rights sites.

On the journey that began March 23 and concluded March 31, the area students and adults joined groups of participants from Chico, Calif., and the San Francisco Bay area.

Key themes of Sojourn to the Past, a rigorous traveling American history course and curriculum based in Millbrae, Calif., are using the lessons of the modern civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s to increase participants’ critical-thinking abilities, develop greater tolerance and acceptance of those who are different from them, tackle racism, homophobia, sexism and adopt the six principles of nonviolence into their lives.

Abrego learned that Dahmer was a major civil rights activist in and around his Hattiesburg, Miss., community before eight members of the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan firebombed his home and general store Jan. 9, 1966, mainly because of his work in helping blacks register to vote. In addition, Dahmer often paid the $2 poll tax for those who couldn’t afford the fee.

When Abrego and the others toured the Dahmer property as part of the trip, she noticed burn marks still visible on some trees from the firebombing — something that left an immediate and indelible impact on her.

“It felt like I was there at that moment. I imagined everything that had happened at that moment,” she said, adding, “After hearing that their father did everything in his power to save his family from the attackers, that’s like a true family.”

Abrego added that the experience has motivated her to tell the stories to others about lesser known civil rights leaders such as Dahmer. Too often, American history books are devoid of mentioning such narratives, so to that end, she hopes to petition the Youngstown school board to include them.

Another major impact Sojourn to the Past had on Abrego was making her more aware and cautious of derogatory and hate-filled speech others in her school and community may use.

TRIUMPH AND TRAGEDY

Echoing that desire was Lilly Snider, 14, a Chaney freshman who said she was deeply moved by the triumphant and tragic story of Medgar Evers, field secretary for the Mississippi NAACP before his assassination June 12, 1963. He was 37.

“It’s really morbid that someone would go out of the way to shoot another person. It was the only time I bawled on the trip,” she recalled.

In February 1994, Byron De La Beckwith, an avowed white supremacist who adhered to the Christian Identity movement, was convicted of shooting Evers as the civil rights leader got out of his car and was sentenced to life in prison.

Specifically, Lilly was deeply touched by sitting on the driveway to Evers’ Jackson, Miss., home and hearing a short presentation from his daughter, Reena Evers Everette, who was 8 when she saw her dying father who had staggered about 25 feet from the vehicle to the family’s side door before collapsing.

“It’s so incomprehensible someone could die in front of an 8-year-old,” Lilly said, adding that she has a 9-year-old sister.

Instead of displaying bitterness and hatred, though, Evers Everette “looked happy and enthusiastic, even after witnessing such a traumatic event,” Lilly observed.

The ninth-grader said she hopes to use her Sojourn experience to educate peers and others about such narratives that extend beyond long repeated sound bites of history related to Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. that have little context.

The trip also has motivated Lilly to speak against Florida’s so-called “Stop WOKE Act” that places restrictions on lessons about race and racism as well as sexual and gender identity, and requires librarians to review such books and remove content deemed inappropriate.

SILENT PEWS

The lesson taught in the sanctuary of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Ala., where the Sept. 15, 1963, bombing left four girls dead and 21 injured, left their mark on 15-year-old Chaney student Terra Robbins. The silence in the pews after the lesson made her think of her late paternal grandmother, who died about a year ago, Terra explained.

Evers’ story also left an impact on her, Terra said, adding she hopes to go on another Sojourn trip. In the meantime, she plans to tell others about what she learned and enjoyed, Terra continued.

Wells said she hopes the recent bus trip through the South will have a lasting effect on the students.

“Just returning from the journey certainly was impactful for all,” she said. “They not only learned history they had never heard before, they learned the principles of nonviolence and learned about social justice, and they learned, like the Little Rock Nine and the children of Birmingham, that they have power as teenagers to make a difference.”