Mar 20, 2025 - Sale 2697

Sale 2697 - Lot 244

Price Realized: $ 1,375
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 1,000 - $ 1,500
(MARTIN LUTHER KING.) "Marching for Equal Rights Now!" cardboard badge from the 1960 Republican Convention protest. 9 x 3½ inches including attached stub; minimal wear. [Chicago]: Afro-American Heritage Association, 25 July 1960
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Additional Details

The next day's newspapers reported that Dr. King led 5,000 marchers to the Republican Convention in Chicago, demanding a strong Civil Rights plank in the party platform.

The badge reads: "Marching for Equal Rights Now! To Be Free By 1963. Emancipation 100 Years, with Martin Luther King, A. Philip Randolph, Roy Wilkins, on the Republican Convention." An attached stub reads "Your Equal Rights Badge, Pin it On July 25th, Come to 41st and Indiana Between 5:00 and 6:30 P.M." None traced at auction or in OCLC.

Provenance: Mary Kouzmanoff Freelon (1919-1982), widow of Harlem Renaissance artist Allan Freelon (1895-1960). She participated in the July 1961 CORE Freedom Ride from Nashville to Jackson, MS. Acquired by the consignor at her estate sale at House in the Woods Auction Gallery in Eagle, WI, 1997.