Day 4 – Rocks

On Tuesday, we had the opportunity to join Joanne Bland and her sister Lynda Blackmon Lowery to hear their stories of marching in Selma in 1965. Both of their stories were very powerful. At one point during our tour with Joanne around Selma, she took us to a courtyard behind a small building and asked each of us to search for a little rock. Once we found our rocks, she asked us to hold them up. I was called up along with several others to stand next to her with my rock. She pointed to my bitty rock, explaining that it was a fragment of the rock that civil rights leader Hosea Williams stood on when he helped to lead the march from Selma to Montgomery. “He was a history maker,” she said, “will you be a history maker, too?” Joanne’s illustration reminded me that I need not be famous to influence history. As a young college student, I can influence history in my own way, even through small actions. I don’t necessarily have to be the person who leads a march or speaks in front of huge crowds. But I can be someone who supports these people and plants seed for change nonetheless.

Jane Mylin

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