In July 1963, at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, teenager Shirley Reese joined a peaceful protest here in Americus, Georgia, with other young Black girls.
Together, they walked to the Martin Theater and tried to buy movie tickets at the window designated for White customers. The police were called, according to Reese. But few could have predicted what would happen next. “All of you are under arrest,” Reese remembers the officer telling the children, all of whom, she said, were between the ages of 12 and 15. And then, without much ceremony, several of the girls were rounded up and taken to a stockade in Leesburg, Georgia, 23 miles outside of town.
They used the hamburger wrapping for toilet paper, she said. “I’d miss my mom. I missed my siblings … my mother’s good food,” Seay said. We didn’t think we would ever get out, Reese said. “We started praying together,” Reese said. “So, we would gather some time and pray. And then we would pray individually, and cry individually. The Stolen Girls Reese and Seay remember the day, nearly a month into their imprisonment, that a White photographer showed up.
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