Edna Griffin - (Stanley Griffin Jr.)

02/26/23 • 43 min

More than a decade before the Civil Rights sit-ins of the 1960s and six years prior to Rosa Parks' refusal to give up her seat, Edna Griffin, a prominent civil rights leader in Iowa, had already made a significant impact. Griffin compelled the notorious Katz drug store in Des Moines, Iowa, to halt its discriminatory practices toward Black customers. This event marked an important moment in Iowa's civil rights history, demonstrating the power of grassroots activism in effecting change.
In 1948, Edna Griffin and two of her friends were denied service at the Katz drugstore. Griffin sued Katz later that year and won the case. Katz appealed to the Iowa Supreme Court but lost again. This landmark legal victory was a significant moment in the history of civil rights in Iowa, and it helped to pave the way for further advances in the struggle for equality.

In this episode, I sat down with Stanley Griffin Jr, a son of Edna Griffin, to talk about his mother, father, and life growing up as Griffin.

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Buxton, Iowa - Black Utopia (Rachelle Chase)

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The town of Buxton, IA was seen as a utopia by many Black Americans who migrated to the town to work at the coal miners. Black and white families lived, worked and played together and their children went to the same schools. White residents included immigrants from Sweden and elsewhere, and they existed peacefully with the African-Americans throughout the community’s history.
Buxton was the town that supported African-American doctors, lawyers and other professionals, with everything integrated in the town, black people in Buxton were shield from all the atrocities that other blacks were facing during the Jim Crow and segregation era. They were living in a utopia world.

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Rose That Grew From Concrete - (Roxanne Conlin)

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Roxanne Conlin is like a rose that bloomed from concrete.
As the eldest of six siblings, she endured a traumatic upbringing in a household plagued by violence, where her father's alcoholism led him to inflict both mental and physical abuse on her mother and children. Nevertheless, Roxanne persevered and rose to become a prominent and influential civil rights attorney in Iowa.
Book Referenced to this episode: Unstoppable The Nine Lives of Roxanne Barton Conlin
Author: William B. Fredricks

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