Andrew Goodman
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Andrew Goodman (November 23, 1943 – June 21, 1964) was an American civil rights activist who was murdered by gunshot in 1964.
He was born and raised in New York City, one of three sons of Robert and Carolyn Goodman, in an intellectual and socially-aware family. An activist from the age of 15, he graduated from the progressive Walden School there. He then attended the University of Wisconsin for a year before transferring to Queens College, New York City, where he was a classmate of Paul Simon. With his brief experience as an off-Broadway actor, he originally planned to study drama, but switched to anthropology.
In 1964, Goodman volunteered, along with fellow activist Mickey Schwerner, to work as part of the "Freedom Summer" project to register blacks to vote in Mississippi. Having protested U.S. President Lyndon Johnson's presence at the opening of that year's World's Fair, Goodman then left with Schwerner to develop civil rights protest strategies at Western College for Women [now part of Miami University] in Oxford, Ohio. In mid-June, Goodman and Schwerner were then sent to Mississippi and began registering blacks to vote.
On the night of June 20, 1964 the two reached Meridian. There, they were joined by a black man named James Chaney, who himself was a civil rights activist. On the morning of June 21, 1964 the three of them set out for Philadelphia, Neshoba County, where they were to investigate the recent burning of a local black church, the Mount Zion Methodist Church.
The three (Chaney, Schwerner and Goodman) were initially arrested by Deputy Sheriff Cecil Price for allegedly driving 35 miles over the 30 mile per hour speed limit. The trio was taken to the jail in Neshoba County where Chaney was booked for speeding, while Schwerner and Goodman were booked "for investigation."
After Chaney was fined $20, the three men were released and told to leave the county. Price followed them on state route 19 to the county line, then turned around at approximately 10:30 p.m. On their way back to Meridian, they were stopped by two carloads of KKK members on a remote rural road. The men approached their car and then shot and killed Schwerner, followed by Goodman, and finally Chaney.
Eventually, the Neshoba County deputy sheriff and conspirators were convicted by Federal prosecutors of civil rights violations, but were never convicted of murder. The case formed the basis of the made-for-TV movies Attack on Terror: The FBI vs. the Ku Klux Klan, Murder in Mississippi, in which Andrew Goodman was portrayed by the actor Josh Charles, and the feature film Mississippi Burning.
Journalist Jerry Mitchell, an award winning investigative reporter for the Jackson Clarion-Ledger had written extensively about the case for many years. Mitchell, who had already earned fame for helping secure convictions in several other high profile Civil Rights Era murder cases, including the assassination of Medgar Evers, the Birmingham Church Bombing, and the murder of Vernon Dahmer, developed new evidence, found new witnesses, and pressured the State to take action. Barry Bradford, an Illinois high school teacher, later famous for helping clear the name of Civil Rights martyr Clyde Kennard, and three students, Allison Nichols, Sarah Siegel, and Brittany Saltiel joined Mitchell's efforts. Their documentary, produced for the National History Day contest presented important new evidence and compelling reasons for reopening the case. They also obtained an interview with Edgar Ray Killen which helped convince the State to reinvestigate. Mitchell was able to determine the identity of "Mr. X" the mystery informer who had helped the FBI discover the bodies and smash the conspiracy of the Klan in 1964, in part using evidence developed by Bradford and the students.
On September 14, 2004 the Mississippi State Attorney General Jim Hood announced that he was gathering evidence for a charge of murder and intended to take the case to a grand jury. On January 7, 2005, Edgar Ray Killen was arrested and found guilty of manslaughter - not murder - on June 21, 2005, exactly 41 years to the day after the murders.
Goodman Mountain, a 2,176 foot peak in the Adirondack Mountain town of Tupper Lake, NY, where he and his family spent their summers, is named in Andrew Goodman's memory. "Those Three are On My Mind" (Pete Seeger) was written to commemorate the three victims, and the Simon & Garfunkel song "He Was My Brother" was dedicated to Goodman.
