Marian Wright Edelman to Speak on Ending the Culture of Violence

Marian Wright Edelman

Marian Wright Edelman, founder and president of the Children's Defense Fund, will speak on Thursday, March 14, at 7 p.m. in Lincoln Theater, in a community call to "End the Culture of Violence."

The program is being sponsored by a number of organizations, including the Jewish Federation of Greater Hartford, University of Hartford, Jewish Community Foundation, Christian Conference of Connecticut, Hartford Seminary, United Way, Connecticut Association for Human Services, Wheeler Clinic, the Bridge Family Center, and Jewish Family Services.

The event is free and open to all. To reserve tickets, call the Lincoln Theater Box Office at 860.768.4228.

Marian Wright Edelman, founder and president of the Children's Defense Fund (CDF), has been an advocate for disadvantaged Americans for her entire professional life. Under her leadership, CDF has become the nation’s strongest voice for children and families.

Edelman, a graduate of Spelman College and Yale Law School, began her career in the mid-1960s when, as the first black woman admitted to the Mississippi Bar, she directed the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund office in Jackson, Mississippi. In 1968, she moved to Washington, D.C., as counsel for the Poor People's Campaign that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. began organizing before his death. She founded the Washington Research Project, a public interest law firm and the parent body of the Children's Defense Fund. For two years she served as the Director of the Center for Law and Education at Harvard University and in 1973 began CDF.

Read more about Marian Wright Edelman.