MEDIA ADVISORY: MU Hosts Civil Rights Activist to Celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day

January 28th, 2015

By Diamond Dixon

WHAT: In celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the University of Missouri will host Myrlie Evers-Williams, a civil rights activist and former chairperson of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Evers-Williams will speak on the topic, “Not Exactly What You Thought.”

This event is sponsored by the Chancellor’s Diversity Initiative as well as local organizations and dozens of schools, colleges and programs across the MU campus.  Through the Chancellor’s Diversity Initiative, MU constantly strives to become a more inclusive, creative and innovative learning and research environment with the ultimate goal to facilitate the competent functioning of students, faculty, staff and administrators in a diverse and competitive global society.

WHO: Evers-Williams is a longtime civil rights activist who has dedicated her life to preserving the legacy of her late husband, Medgar Evers, a prominent civil rights leader in Mississippi who was murdered outside their home in 1963. Evers-Williams has a diverse background in journalism and advertising and is author of the autobiography, “Watch Me Fly: What I Learned on the Way to Becoming the Woman I Was Meant to Be.”

WHEN &
WHERE: 7 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 28
Missouri Theatre, 203 S. Ninth Street
Columbia, Mo.

NOTE: A limited number of free tickets to the event are available.

*EDITOR’S NOTE: A short media availability for Evers-Williams will occur before her speech. Media interested in participating must contact Nathan Hurst hurstn@missouri.edu before noon on Jan. 28.