Ezra Cunningham

Civil rights activist dies at age 89
Thursday, December 14, 2006
By CONNIE BAGGETT
Staff Reporter

MONROEVILLE -- A man hailed as a civil rights champion was laid to rest Wednesday in the county he loved.

Ezra Cunningham, 89, was born the son of a blacksmith and farmer in Beatrice in north Monroe County. He died Dec. 7.

He was educated at Alabama State University and became a teacher. He soon left that career to farm and organized other black farmers in a 10-county area of west Alabama into a cooperative.

That co-op produced truckloads of cucumbers the farmers marketed in Selma. The work earned him a place in the civil rights movement, he often said. He attended political meetings and soon became a liaison with the U.S. Department of Justice as desegregation began.

Local leaders said Wednesday that Cunningham helped dozens of black residents in Monroe County register to vote, at times risking his own life.

"I drove up to Beatrice and interviewed him for the museum," said Mary Tucker, a former educator and current Monroe County Heritage Museums board member.

"We talked extensively about his activities in the civil rights movement during the 1950s and 1960s," Tucker said.

"He told me that he made a deal with county registrars in order to be able to register blacks to vote. The officials agreed to register only five people at a time," Tucker said.

"That way, it wouldn't look like there was a huge influx of people being registered. He brought many in to register, five at the time," Tucker said.