Myrlie Evers-Williams

Myrlie Evers-Williams, born in 1933, civil rights activist and chairperson of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) (1995-1998). Evers-Williams became the first woman to lead the nation's oldest civil rights organization in 1995, at a time when it had been surrounded by scandal and controversy. Evers-Williams's positive reputation among civil rights activists, and blacks in general, made her election a cause for renewed optimism among NAACP supporters.

She was born Myrlie Beasley in Vicksburg, Mississippi, and was raised by her grandmother and an aunt. In 1950 she enrolled at then all-black Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College (now Alcorn State University) in Lorman, Mississippi. There she met another student, Medgar Evers, a veteran and native Mississippian. They were married in 1951, and the next year they moved to Mound Bayou, in the Mississippi Delta region, where he sold insurance.

Starting in 1954 Medgar Evers worked full-time as field secretary for the NAACP in Mississippi. Myrlie Evers served as her husband's secretary in the Jackson, Mississippi, office of the NAACP, and in that capacity played a significant role in advancing the civil rights cause. During the next nine years they led other blacks in challenging racial segregation and discrimination in what was generally considered one of the most racist states in the nation.

In June 1963 Medgar Evers was shot and killed as he entered his Jackson home. His murder brought national attention to the evils of racism in the South, particularly in Mississippi. Byron De La Beckwith, the white assassin, was tried several times, but was not convicted of the murder until 1994. Although devastated personally by her loss, Myrlie Evers became a symbol of courage as well as tragedy in the civil rights movement. She and coauthor William Peters wrote a biography of her late husband, Us the Living (1967).

Myrlie Evers and her three children moved to California in 1964, where she received her B.A. degree from Pomona College in 1968, lectured for the NAACP, and began a career in business. She remained active in civil rights work and politics, running unsuccessfully for the Congress of the United States in 1970 and serving as commissioner of public works for Los Angeles in 1987. She also worked for two years for an advertising agency, and for ten years she was the director of community affairs for a Los Angeles corporation. In 1976 she married Walter Williams, a longshoreman, union organizer, and civil rights activist, who died in 1995.

In February 1995 Evers-Williams was elected chairperson of the national board of the NAACP by one vote over incumbent William Gibson. Her election followed more than a year of turmoil and dissension within the 500,000-member organization. The organization faced financial troubles, including a debt estimated between $3 million and $4 million, and a scandal that surrounded the former executive director, Benjamin Chavis, who was accused of using NAACP funds to prevent a sexual harassment lawsuit. Evers-Williams was the first woman to become chairperson of the NAACP and, to many members, she represented a new beginning and new possibilities for the organization.

In early 1998 Evers-Williams decided not to run for another term as NAACP chairperson and instead chose to pursue other projects. In particular, she started the Medgar Evers Institute to promote education, training, and economic development. Civil rights leader Julian Bond succeeded Evers-Williams as NAACP chairperson.