Co-authors of Climbing the Rough Side of the Mountain: the Extraordinary Story of Love, Civil Rights & Labor Activism

Thursday, January 29, 6 p.m. In person & via Zoom

REGISTER HERE for Zoom discussion with the Hills

When Velma Murphy was knocked unconscious by a brick thrown by a man from an angry white mob and was carried away by Norman Hill, it was the beginning of a six-decade-long love story and the turmoil, excitement, and struggle for civil rights and labor movements. In Climbing the Rough Side of the Mountain, the Hills reflect upon their more than half a century of fighting to make America realize the best of itself.

Born in New Jersey, Norman Hill came to Chicago where he was the Chicago Coordinator for the Civil Rights movement. He led efforts to desegregate Chicago beaches, helped organize the 1963 March on Washington, where he stood with A. Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin, and was the national program director for the Congress on Racial Equality. He was the AFL-CIO Industrial Union Department’s Civil Rights liaison, and director of the A. Philip Randolph Institute.

Velma Murphy Hill, a graduate of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, was a leader of the Chicago Wade-In to integrate Rainbow Beach, East Coast field secretary for CORE, and assistant to the president of the United Federation of Teachers, where she unionized 10,000 paraprofessionals, mostly Black and Hispanic, working in New York public schools. She was vice president of the American Federation of Teachers and International Affairs and civil rights director of the Service Employees International Union.