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Meet Georgia Gilmore the female hero who contributed to ending transport segregation
Food is one of those things like music and other arts that manages to bring people together. No matter who you are, where you come from, I am pretty sure you all enjoy sitting and eating delicious food. This is how badass chef Georgia Gilmore helped bring about a revolution during the Montgomery bus boycott in Alabama in 1955.
After Rosa Parks was arrested for not leaving her seat on a Montgomery bus, The Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) started a boycott on the Montgomery bus line. Gilmore also stopped using the bus and became involved with the MIA. As a result, she lost her job as a chef, however, Martin Luther King saw her courageous involvement and decided to help her set up her own restaurant in her home.
This was the beginning of her journey as an underground hero. Gilmore started cooking to feed the civil rights party members and boycotters part of the MIA, while fiercely defending equal rights and actively boycotting the Montgomery bus line. She also used the funds gained from her cooking to fund the civil rights party campaign.
Georgia Gilmore cooking
Gilmore went on to create The Club From Nowhere, which involved a group of women, black and white baking and selling pies, cookies and cakes in beauty salons. Gilmore created it in all anonymity so that it would avoid conflicts. Eventually, the group became so popular that it generated a significant amount of funds to the Montgomery bus boycott.
Speaking on the club In the Eyes On The Price documentary in 1986 Gilmore said: "Well, in order to make the mass meeting and the boycott be a success and that keep the carpool running, we decided that the people's on the south side would get a club and the peoples on the west side would get a club and so we decided that we wouldn't name the club anything, we'd just say it was the club from nowhere and I had a lot of white peoples who contributed."
Consequently, Georgia Gilmore teaches us that the anyone can bring about change, whether that be in your community or the world. All it takes is a big idea, some self-belief and taking the initiative.
To learn more about Georgia Gilmore and the legacy she left behind watch the video below:
