The Civil Rights History Project: Survey of Collections and Repositories

[Raymond O. Arsenault civil rights oral history collection]

Repository: [Raymond O. Arsenault repository]

Collection Description (CRHP): Professor Ray Arsenault, who wrote an acclaimed book on the freedom rides, has in his possession 4-5 valuable interviews of Freedom Riders, some of whom are now deceased, including Hank Thomas, Ben Cox, and Ed Blankenheim.

Digital Status: No

Extent: audio recordings; video recordings

Language: English

Related Archival Items: He also has copies of interviews with John Seigenthaler and other related material. Along with Professor Robert Bickel, he's taken students on bus tours of the civil rights movement, and they've made documentary films of these experience. They also have videotaped interviews and panel discussions, including of civil rights activists Bernard LaFayette, Diane Nash, and C. T. Vivian. He has copies of these materials. See the database entry on the project "Constitutional Law and the Civil Rights Movement: Visiting History and Heroes" for the original copies of the materials of the civil rights bus tours.

Interviewees: Hank Thomas, Ben Cox, and Ed Blankenheim

Rights (CRHP): Contact the repository which holds the collection for information on rights

Subjects:

Civil rights movements--Southern States
Civil rights workers
Freedom Rides, 1961
Segregation in transportation

Genres:

Interviews
Sound recordings
Videorecordings