"The Abolitionists" (PBS documentary) & "The Loving Story" (film): Civil Rights Center (I.U. at South Bend, Indiana): Feb. 2014

posted at IUSB dot-edu slash/news : Two films on the civil rights struggles will be shown in February at the IU South Bend Civil Rights Heritage Center at the Natatorium, 1040 W. Washington St. in South Bend, Indiana. The first film is the PBS documentary “The Abolitionists” and it will be presented at 6:30 p.m. Monday, Feb. 10, 2014 at the Natatorium. Frederick Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison, Harriet Beecher Stowe, John Brown and Angelina Grimké turned a fringe movement against slavery into a force that changed the nation. A discussion will follow with Monica Tetzlaff, associate professor of history. “The Loving Story” (2011) will be shown at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 26, at the Natatorium. A discussion will follow with Marc Rodriguez, director of the Civil Rights Heritage Center. The documentary movie (77 minutes) is the story of Richard and Mildred Loving, an interracial couple whose love was strong enough to change history. This Oscar-shortlisted film is the definitive account of the landmark 1967 Supreme Court decision that legalized interracial marriage: Loving v. Virginia. Married in Washington, D.C. on June 2, 1958, Richard Loving and Mildred Jeter returned home to Virginia where their marriage was declared illegal -- he was white, and she was black and Native American. The films are sponsored by the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Civil Rights Heritage Center. The center is a unit in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, IU South Bend.