Book Talk and Signing

Charlene Butts Ligon discusses her book about her mother, Fearless: How a Poor Virginia Seamstress Took on Jim Crow, Beat the Poll Tax, and Changed Her City Forever, which tells the story of Evelyn T. Butts, a poor seamstress who became a forceful and courageous voting rights champion and won a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case that abolished the poll tax.

Location:
Bible Way Baptist Church
2019 Savage Road
Charleston, South Carolina

LECTURE

Join Charlene Butts Ligon as she discusses her book about her mother, Fearless: How a Poor Virginia Seamstress Took on Jim Crow, Beat the Poll Tax, and Changed Her City Forever, which tells the story of Evelyn T. Butts, a poor seamstress who became a forceful and courageous voting rights champion and won a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case that abolished the poll tax.

Location:
Virginia Museum of History & Culture
428 N Arthur Ashe Boulevard, Richmond, Virginia
Robins Family Forum
Part of the Banner Lecture Series category.

2020 Evelyn Butts Voting Rights Art & Essay Contest

February is African American History Month, and what better way to celebrate than learning about important figures who have impacted history. This year, the Norfolk Public Library, the City of Norfolk, and Norfolk Public Schools want every student from pre-K to 12^th grade to reflect on the 2020 theme, “African Americans and the Vote,” by participating in the city-wide “Voting Rights” art and essay contest.

The contest is also a way to honor local civil rights activist Evelyn Butts, who is best known for challenging the poll tax in the 1960s and taking her case before the United States Supreme Court. Butts eventually won her case to get the poll tax eliminated with the help of Joseph A. Jordan Jr., a civil rights attorney who later became the first African American member of the Norfolk City Council since Reconstruction. Jordan was also the first African American judge for the Norfolk General District Court.

Students are encouraged to read about Jordan, Butts and other trailblazers, and to create an expression of what they have learned in the form of an artwork or essay. This contest is open to all Norfolk homeschool, public, private, and parochial school students in grades pre-K through 12.