Civil Rights Film Series to Conclude with Bayard Rustin Documentary

Bayard Rustin is best known for his work organizing the historic 1963 March on Washington.

A three-part film and discussion series on the legacy of the Civil Rights Movement will conclude on Tuesday, Feb. 12,  with a showing of the documentary Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin.

Following the film screening, there will be a discussion led by Bilal Sekou, associate professor of political science in Hillyer College.

The program, which is free and open to the public, will begin at 7 p.m. in Konover Campus Center. Light refreshments will be provided.

Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin chronicles Bayard Rustin's complex, 60-year career as an activist. The film contains rare archival footage, including debates between Rustin and Malcolm X as well as between Rustin and Stokely Carmichael.

Rustin is best known for his work organizing the historic 1963 March on Washington, the biggest protest America had ever witnessed. As an illegitimate son, an African American, a gay man and a one-time member of the Communist Party, Rustin—the ultimate outsider—eventually became a public figure and respected political insider. He not only shaped Civil Rights Movement strategy as a longtime advisor to Martin Luther King Jr., but was known and respected by numerous U.S. presidents and foreign leaders.

The University of Hartford presented Rustin with an Honorary Doctor of Laws in 1979. During its 56-year history, the University has honored more than two dozen prominent African Americans with honorary degrees, from opera star Marian Anderson in 1958 to champion tennis player Arthur Ashe in 1990 to NAACP Executive Director Benjamin Hooks in 1994, as well as jazz great Dizzy Gillespie in 1982 and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright August Wilson in 1998. In addition, the University hosted Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1959 for an address to the residents of Greater Hartford.

The three-part film and discussion series on the Civil Rights Movement was organized by the University's Martin Luther King Day Planning Committee, in order to extend its annual Martin Luther King Day celebration into Black History Month.