Annual Wm. Reece Smith, Jr. Banquet
Tue, Mar 25
|Great Hall, Stetson Law
Join Stetson University College of Law in welcoming Janice Wesley Kelsey, Civil Rights Activist, as our Distinguished Lecturer at the Annual Wm. Reece Smith, Jr. Banquet on March 25, 2025, in Stetson Law’s Great Hall.
Time & Location
Mar 25, 2025, 4:00 PM
Great Hall, Stetson Law, 1401 61st St S, Gulfport, FL 33707, USA
About the event
The first 100 guests to register will receive a copy of Ms. Wesley’s book, I Woke Up with My Mind on Freedom, and are invited to join us in a VIP reception and book signing co-sponsored by the St. Petersburg Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation (TRHT) Center that will begin at 4 p.m. that afternoon in the Stetson Law Library.
JANICE WESLEY KELSEY
Janice Kelsey grew up in Birmingham, Alabama at the height of segregation, attending an all black school and church. She began attending mass meetings hosted by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and was influenced by the sermons of James Bevel. Kelsey grew to understand the inequities between her school and the nearby white schools and decided to march in the Children’s Crusade in 1963. She was jailed as a child for her participation in the Children’s March. She lost a dear friend when 16th Street Baptist Church…