#Jesus as #socialjustice Fannie Lou Hamer was the youngest of 20 children who started out working in #MontgomeryCounty #Mississippi as a sharecropper picking cotton at the age of 6. She managed to go to school until about 8th grade before having to drop out at age 13. By the time she was an adult, she could pick between 200-300 pounds a day. When the plantation owner found out she was literate, she was placed in charge of keeping the books and time clocks. In 1961, Hamer was given a hysterectomy against her knowledge after going in to get a tumor removed. She coined the phrase "Mississippi Appendectomy" to describe the racist practice of doctors violating black women as their way to control the states "poor black population". She was the first person to volunteer to register to vote after a rousing sermon from SNCC ORGANIZER James Bevel in 1962, losing her job after going to register. She became known in Civil Rights circles as the lady who sings the hymns because she used hymns as a way to strengthen the resolve of those going into the danger of attempting to register to vote in MS. She worked with the #RCNL and then became an integral part of #SNCC. Hamer helped to organize voter registration drives and had an important role in organizing #FreedomSummer. In 1963 on her way back from a voter drive, Hamer and her crew were falsely arrested. Hamer was beaten almost to death with a blackjack, taking a over a month to recover. But she got back out in the streets as soon as she was well, hosting white and black students who came to MS to fight for justice. Hamer became the Vice President of the Freedom Democratic party of MS, which forced the anti-civil rights all white Democratic Delegation, having ZERO problems calling black men in the party to task when they continued to accept horrible concessions made by the party's leaders. She was pretty much removed from the process. After a failed attempt at running for congress, Hamer continued to work on projects designed to help the poor like Head Start, the Poor People's Project, and the Freedom Farm Cooperative. Hamer received several honorary degrees, was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame, and...