An Interview With Charles Evers – 1969 – Past Daily Reference Room

. . . or click on the link here for Audio Player – NBC – Speaking Freely – Charles Evers – June 25, 1969 – Gordon Skene Sound Collection.

As Field Director for the Mississippi Chapter of the NAACP, Charles Evers was no stranger to the intense and often deadly struggle taking place in the South during the decade of the 60s. As older brother to the slain civil rights leader Medgar Evers, the younger Charles was thrust into the forefront of a battle which seemed never to end.

In 1969, he became the first African-American since reconstruction, to be elected Mayor of a Mississippi city. He has been in the front lines of the Civil Rights battle in the South and has been an outspoken critic, not only of the Segregationists, but some members of the Civil Rights movement itself.

In this 1969 interview, recorded in June of that year, Evers discusses with NBC News correspondent Edwin Newman the Civil Rights movement, his brother Medgar and the state of race relations in America in 1969.

Here is that complete interview, as it was first broadcast on June 25, 1969.