Childhood
Born in Pike County Alabama, near the city of Troy, on February 21st, 1940, Lewis grew up in rural poverty. When he was old enough, he had to work alongside his parents, who were sharecroppers, and his experiences in the fields left their mark on him. Every time his father turned in a bale of cotton to his farm owners, they would “take half the bale right off the top for themselves [and] … then, from the other half, they would subtract whatever my father might owe them for the supplies they might have fronted him earlier in the year-seed, fertilizer, equipment. What was left after all that was ours” (42). Lewis realized that what his father received was “never enough” and that the “sharecropper’s life was nothing but a bottomless pit” (42). Seeing his father “sink deeper and deeper into debt, broke Lewis’ heart and made him angry” (43). He began speaking out against the injustice of sharecropping, repeatedly telling his parents “This is nothing but gambling. We’re betting on getting ahead, but there ain’t no way. We’re gonna lose. We’re always gonna lose” (43). One time his mother responded by saying “what else are we going to do? You got to work to make a living” (43). Unconvinced, Lewis replied “not like this, nobody should have to work like this” (43). This exchange is important for two reasons. First, the response of Lewis’ mother reveals how dire the economic situation was for most African Americans in the South. Good jobs were unavailable to them, as were any opportunities for economic advancement. Consequently, they were forced to be sharecroppers. Second, Lewis’ comments demonstrate an understanding of the plight of African Americans and a desire to improve it. At this time Lewis was just six years old, but he was already showing signs of devotion to the empowerment of African Americans. His devotion only grew as he aged. Having to attend segregated schools that lacked the funding and resources of white schools, ride in broken-down school buses on unpaved roads while seeing white children ride in new school buses on paved roads, have a shorter school year than white children, frequently miss school because of the effects of poor weather on unpaved roads and to help his parents sharecrop while white children did not, use “colored” water fountains and bathrooms, exude deference in every interaction with whites, look at a monument of John Wilkes Booth whenever he went to Troy, and not eat, drink, or sit in certain establishments contributed to this growth. Being denied access to Troy’s public library did as well.
All of these experiences were important in Lewis’ development, but there were four events that stand out above the rest. The first was his trip North with his uncle in the summer of 1951. Visiting relatives in Buffalo, Lewis was amazed by the difference in racial climate and how much better life appeared to be for African Americans there than it was in Alabama. When he returned to home, he became even more aware of how oppressed Southern African Americans were. The second was him reading black newspapers and magazines including Jet, Ebony, the Pittsburgh Courier, the Baltimore Afro-American, and the Chicago Defender for the first time at his high school’s library. It was from these newspapers and magazines that Lewis learned about the Brown v. The Board of Education of Topeka supreme court case declaring school segregation unconstitutional. This ruling gave Lewis hope for a better future and seeing those around him feeling the same way strengthened his hope. The third was him hearing Martin Luther King Jr speak about the Montgomery bus boycott on the radio. Enthralled by King’s voice and message, Lewis became obsessed with him. He began scouring the school library for information on King and subscribed to his idea of the social gospel, or the application of Christianity to social reform. These three events lit a fire under Lewis and gave him desire to take action. However, he never acted on this desire. That is, until the fourth event, Emmett Till’s murder. What happened to Till, combined with his killers walking free, shook Lewis to his core. For the first time in his life, he understood how little black lives mattered in the South. He also understood that it could have been him. “Chewing himself up with questions and frustration and anger … at the system that encouraged and allowed hatred and inhumanity to exist, [Lewis] couldn’t accept the way things were” (58). Influenced by “what he saw up north, in the rulings that were coming down from the courts. What he saw at home, in the South, where the liens of white backlash and violence were being drawn in response to those rulings. And … what he saw just up the highway, in Montgomery, with the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr and the Montgomery bus boycott … Lewis adopted the philosophy of nonviolence and passive resistance” (58-9). His first move was creating a petition to desegregate the Troy public library. Nothing came of it, but it was still a start. Shortly thereafter, when John Patterson, Alabama attorney general, obtained a court order banning the NAACP in Alabama, Lewis protested by becoming a youth member of the organization. His most successful protest though, was being accepted to American Baptist Theological Seminary in Nashville. By going to college, Lewis gave himself the potential for a better life than the South ever intended him to have.