Ernest McMillian Oral History

Object number2006.001.0003

Date01/25/2006

ClassificationsOral Histories

Oral history interview subject Ernest McMillan Jr.

Oral history interviewer Stephen Fagin

ObjectOral history

Credit LineOral History Collection/The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza

MediumHi-8 videotape

DimensionsDuration: 46 Minutes

Terms

Collections

Civil Rights Movement
All Online Objects
Oral History Collection

DescriptionVideotaped oral history interview with Ernest McMillan. An outspoken human rights activist, McMillan was attending Morehouse College in Atlanta at the time of the Kennedy assassination. While in Georgia, he met Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and became active with the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee. McMillan later co-founded the Dallas chapter of SNCC and ultimately served more than three years in federal prison following a local civil rights demonstration. Interview recorded January 25, 2006 at The Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza by Stephen Fagin. The interview is forty-six minutes long.

Curatorial Commentary

This was the Museum's first recording with human rights activist Ernest McMillan. After this 2006 session, he became a great friend of our institution and has returned on numerous occasions to take part in public and educational programs. He also recorded a follow-up oral history in 2019. Several of his program recordings may be viewed on the Museum's YouTube channel, including this powerful virtual conversation from 2019 with a group of young people incarcerated at a juvenile detention facility in Los Angeles: Living History with Ernest McMillan (2019) - YouTube.

Here in the Museum's online collections database, an oral history with Ernest's late mother, beloved local activist Eva McMillan, may be viewed here: https://emuseum.jfk.org/objects/26179. A late 1960s civil rights poster featuring McMillan may be found here in the Eva McMillan Collection: https://emuseum.jfk.org/objects/29169. -- Stephen Fagin, Curator