Early Life
Albert Sampson overcame a childhood stutter to find a rich oratory voice. While in high school in Massachusetts, he found himself drawn to a “little yellow book” written by Mohandas Gandhi, stressing nonviolent demonstration. Martin Luther King personally ordained Sampson, who had studied at Shaw University in North Carolina.
Activism
Sampson staged sit-ins, pushed to open doors of the state’s White-serving hotels, and plotted strategy with his close friend, the Reverend Jesse Jackson. After leaving Atlanta, he became pastor of Fernwood United Methodist Church in Chicago in 1975, operating the church for several decades until semi-retiring in 2013.
Community and Advocacy
In 2003, the Illinois House of Representatives honored Sampson’s church for its significant contributions to the community, including computer classes, senior programs, energy assistance, and youth enrichment services. Sampson led initiatives such as launching a farmers market to support struggling Black farmers and encouraging congregants to buy produce from southern farms. He is currently leading efforts to reopen the church.
Quotations
While describing Albert Dunn, says Sampson:
“In Atlanta he emerged as a forceful voice. He was a religious man who was not shy to confront others, including his schoolmates. “He was always grounded in challenging us to live up to our faith. And don’t play preacher,” says Albert Sampson, a onetime seminary student at the ITC. “His thing was you can’t play preacher.”
Greene, Ronnie. Heart of Atlanta: Five Black Pastors and the Supreme Court Victory for Integration (pp. 53). Chicago Review Press. Kindle Edition.
Sampson’s Description to Dr. King
Sampson shared his brothers’ hunger to catapult the color barricade in Atlanta establishments and says King’s vision guided them. According to Sampson, “he was a thinker. Dr. King said it’s either nonviolence or nonexistence. Nonviolence is another chemical that puts out the fire.”
Greene, Ronnie. Heart of Atlanta: Five Black Pastors and the Supreme Court Victory for Integration (pp. 54). Chicago Review Press. Kindle Edition.
Alabama Gun Incident
In Eutaw, Alabama, Sampson challenged squalid conditions at a school for Black students, which he said offered a chemistry lab without equipment and a library without books. One day he led a pack of students in a march toward the school for White students, which featured those and other amenities. A sheriff pulled out a long revolver and put it to his face. “If you make another move, Martin Coon, I am going to kill you,” the lawman said, using the derogatory variation on the civil rights leader’s name. Sampson glimpsed two FBI agents sitting in a blue Chevrolet watching the scene unfold, and he was chilled to see they were laughing. “I said to them, ‘I don’t understand what you’re laughing about. He’s got a gun to my head.’ They said, ‘Well, reverend, the reason we are laughing is it’s kind of funny that we can’t do nothing until he blows your head off.’” “That gun had a long, long, long barrel,” Sampson said. He turned to see the children watching the episode unfold, and with the gun still pointed at him, began to sing. Ain’t gonna let nobody turn me ’round, Turn me ’round, turn me ’round. Ain’t gonna let nobody, turn me ’round. I’m gonna keep on a-walkin’, keep on a-talkin’, Marchin’ on to freedom land. He later helped desegregate the school.
Greene, Ronnie. Heart of Atlanta: Five Black Pastors and the Supreme Court Victory for Integration (pp. 57). Chicago Review Press. Kindle Edition.
Civil Rights Act Passage
“It was part of my movement history,” he said. “Sit-in demonstrations in North Carolina. Coming to Atlanta, I had to speak out about all these issues.”
Greene, Ronnie. Heart of Atlanta: Five Black Pastors and the Supreme Court Victory for Integration (pp. 57). Chicago Review Press. Kindle Edition.
August 11
As Sampson’s group pulled into the familiar low-slung diner, Maddox stood ready for them, armed with a pistol at his side and a mob of some two hundred supporters. Nearby, a barrel held axe handles available for sale. Maddox rallied his supporters for another stand against his would-be invaders. “We are never going to integrate!” he yelled. “The Pickrick belongs to Lester Maddox, not to Lyndon Johnson or the news media or the agitators or Nikita Khrushchev!” Then he turned his attention toward the ministers at his door. “You’re dirty Communists and you’ll never get a piece of fried chicken here,” Maddox shouted, keeping his firearm in its holster as he thrust his fingers at the men. Maddox still had to resolve his earlier gun charge so, while he was sure to let the ministers know he had the weapon on hand, he didn’t point it at anyone’s face this time. As he witnessed Maddox packing a pistol, Sampson braced for an attack, knowing that he or one of his friends could suffer serious injury or worse. The most haunting image, he said, was the barrel filled with pickaxe handles nearby and the specter of Maddox supporters grabbing them as weapons. “We were really under the impression we were really going to die there. It was not only his gun,” Sampson said recently. “I can never forget the barrel.”
Greene, Ronnie. Heart of Atlanta: Five Black Pastors and the Supreme Court Victory for Integration (pp. 116-117). Chicago Review Press. Kindle Edition.