On this day, 10 September 1962, white supremacists attempted to assassinate civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer in Mississippi. While she was staying with her friend Mary Tucker, racists drove by, firing 16 shots at her, all of which fortunately missed. Hamer (born Townsend) had been attempting to register to vote, but had been denied the right to do so by a racist Jim Crow registration test which had been designed to prevent Black people and Native Americans from registering to vote. Hamer failed the registration test after she was unable to answer a question asking her to explain “de facto laws”.
Learn more about the Jim Crow era in these books: https://shop.workingclasshistory.com/collections/books/david-pilgrim https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/1524828627702282/?type=3