- Collection:
- Oral Histories of the American South: The Civil Rights Movement
- Title:
- Oral history interview with Jean Fairfax, October 15, 1983
- Creator:
- Fairfax, Jean, 1920-
- Contributor to Resource:
- Blanchard, Dallas A.
Southern Oral History Program - Date of Original:
- 1985-03-06
- Subject:
- Southern States--Race relations
Fellowship of Southern Churchmen
African American civil rights workers--North Carolina
African American women civil rights workers--Southern States
Civil rights movements--Southern States
Civil rights workers--Southern States
Civil rights--Religious aspects--Christianity - People:
- Fairfax, Jean, 1920-2019
- Location:
- United States, North Carolina, 35.50069, -80.00032
United States, Southern States, 33.346678, -84.119434 - Medium:
- transcripts
sound recordings
oral histories (literary works) - Type:
- Text
Sound - Format:
- text/html
text/xml
audio/mpeg - Description:
- Jean Fairfax was born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio. Following her education in theology, Fairfax moved South where she served as the Dean of Women at both Kentucky State College and Tuskegee Institute. Fairfax resided in the South from 1942 until 1946; thereafter, she spent two years abroad doing missionary work, after which she moved to New England. Around 1957, she returned to the South, where she became actively involved in the civil rights movement. In this interview, Fairfax focuses primarily on her perceptions of the Fellowship of Southern Churchmen, paying particular attention to its goals and its leaders. According to Fairfax, the primary goal of the Fellowship was to promote universal Christian fellowship. Because of the emphasis on unity, the Fellowship was increasingly concerned with issues of race and desegregation. Fairfax recalls that challenging racism was a present theme in the activities of the Fellowship while she was associated with the organization, and she asserts that its views on gender and class were also progressive. In addition, Fairfax describes leaders within the Fellowship. While she focuses primarily on the leadership roles and styles of Nelle Morton and Reinhold Niebuhr, she also offers her thoughts on such leaders as Howard "Buck" Kester, Charles Jones, and Will Campbell. Fairfax concludes that her work in the civil rights movement was a natural outgrowth of her involvement in the Fellowship of Southern Churchmen and explains that the Fellowship gave her both confidence in herself and in others in the pursuit of challenging Jim Crow segregation.
The Civil Rights Digital Library received support from a National Leadership Grant for Libraries awarded to the University of Georgia by the Institute of Museum and Library Services for the aggregation and enhancement of partner metadata. - Metadata URL:
- http://docsouth.unc.edu/sohp/F-0013/menu.html
- Language:
- eng
- Extent:
- Title from menu page (viewed on Oct. 30, 2008).
Interview participants: Jean Fairfax, interviewee; Dallas Blanchard, interviewer.
Duration: 00:52:09.
This electronic edition is part of the UNC-Chapel Hill digital library, Documenting the American South. It is a part of the collection Oral histories of the American South.
Text encoded by Jennifer Joyner. Sound recordings digitized by Aaron Smithers. - Contributing Institution:
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Documenting the American South (Project)
- Rights:
-
