“A lot of them were scared to get in the march,” said Emma Jackson. “I wasn’t.

My nerves was good then, good and strong.

A lot of them were told that if they got in the march they would have to leave, but I owned my own place.”

Even at the age of 96, Jackson still remembers ‘Bloody Sunday’ well.

In response to the discrimination and intimidation that had kept Selma’s black citizens from voting, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee organized a march to Montgomery in hopes of bringing attention to the violation of their rights.

On Sunday, March 7, 1965 about 600 civil rights marchers began traveling east out of Selma. They only made it to the Edmund Pettus Bridge. State troopers, and local law enforcement, some on horseback waited for the marchers.

“I was a little skittish when I started marching,” said Jackson. “They tried to run these horses over us and put the tear gas on us. Old Wallace told them not to let us cross that bridge.”

They began attacking the marchers with billy clubs, bull whips, and tear gas until they were driven back into Selma.

“A lot of the men wasn’t state troopers,” said Jackson. “They were just plain white folks.”

The marchers were left bloodied and severely injured, and seventeen had to be hospitalized.

Images of the attack and the battered marchers were televised across the country.

This incident became known as ‘Bloody Sunday.’

“On the steps of the jail, they started beating us down. They jabbed me in the stomach first and I said don’t hit me in my stomach, then they pulled me beside the head with that stick.”

Jackson did not go to the hospital after being attacked. She did, however, decide that her marching days were over.

“I said I wasn’t going back in that march,” said Jackson.

But she did. “I figured if they killed me, they couldn’t eat me.”

Jackson estimates that she was a part of the voting rights movement for about a month.

The second march, held on March 9, was strictly symbolic.

Because a court order kept them from going all the way into Montgomery, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. led the marchers onto the Edmund Pettus Bridge for a brief prayer session and then led them back into the city.

The voting rights movement continued to grow.

On the third and final march, held on March 21, 3,200 marchers set out from Selma to Montgomery, about 50 miles away. They walked about 12 miles a day and slept in various homes and churches overnight.

“We stayed overnight in a church,” said Jackson. “A white lady asked if she could lay beside me and I said yeah, she was welcome.”

By the time they reached the capitol on Thursday, March 25, the number of marchers had grown to 25,000.

Nearly five months after this last march, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

According to Jackson, she feels bad that people choose not to vote after she and others who marched got them that chance.

“As long as I am able to vote, I will go,” said Jackson.

Her daughter, Synethia Holyfield,

who said that her mother refuses to sign an absentee ballot, took Jackson to the 2004 election.

Jackson’s strength and perseverance are not new.

Born in Sardis on February 28, 1909 to Matt and Lou Vert Hatcher, Jackson was told that she was so small that she could fit into a coffee pot.

She did not know that much about her parents because her mother died a few hours after giving birth to her.

Jackson had two older sisters, but upon her mother’s death, all three children were separated and given away by their father. Jackson was given to her grandmother and then later to an aunt.

She did not see her two sisters until she was grown.

Jackson was raised in a very religious home.

Attending church was what she looked forward to each week. Because her help was needed on the farm, she attended school only up until the fourth grade.

In 1929 she married Sidney Holyfield, a farmer and a carpenter. After a 17 year marriage, they divorced. She remarried later on in life, but after 18 years, her second husband Aaron Jackson died.

During her lifetime, Jackson raised eight children and two step-children. She said loved them all equally and had no favorites.

Although wives were not usually allowed to work outside the home in those days, Jackson worked while raising her family.

She worked in a school cafeteria, in an okra factory, at the Selma Steam Laundry, and on her own farm.

“I used to pick two hundred pounds of cotton a day,” said Jackson. “I had my garden and I raised collards, turnips, cabbage, tomatoes, peppers, and okra.”

Jackson lived alone until June 2004.

In order to keep her mother company and “make sure that she was eating right” Holyfield moved from Atlanta.

“I just picked up everything and left,” said Holyfield. “I’m glad I made the sacrifice to move here and I would do it again if necessary.”

According to Holyfield, her mother is a fighter.

“She’s a kind, Christian hearted person, but she is still strong willed. She gets up and cleans the church every Sunday, but if she doesn’t, she sends someone else.”

Holyfield and her sister Linda Bender both agree that their mother was strict, but not overly strict.

“We had to keep a spotless house. We worked, we obeyed, and we treated everyone with respect. We love and thank her for that.”

Holyfield and Bender still show their mother the utmost respect.

“We never make her mad. We still let her have her say – she has good wisdom.”

The years have been wonderful to Jackson.

Other than a slight hearing problem and high blood pressure, she is in excellent health.

When she was 69, Jackson had surgery to remove gallstones.

“Mom was in intensive care in the hospital,” said Holyfield. “We all came to visit her and she was sitting up in bed with her glasses on, looking through her purse!”

According to Jackson, she was checking to make sure that her money was still there.

Three years ago, at the age of 93, Jackson was involved in a wreck. While on the way to pay her electrical bill, a fully loaded log truck ran into the passenger side of the car she was sitting on.

That side of the car was so damaged, that Jackson had to crawl over to the driver’s side of the car to get out. Once she got out of the car, Jackson walked to Pioneer Electric and paid her bill.

“It shook her up, but she went to the hospital after paying the bill,” said Holyfield.

“It hurt my neck, hip, and back,” said Jackson who still has occasional pains from the accident.

Jackson enjoys baking, quilting, tending to her flower garden, and watching television.

“My favorite show is the Young and the Restless,” she said.

Although her quilts are beautiful, Jackson is famous for her homemade cakes.

“Anytime people find out that “Lil-bay” (her nickname) has brought a cake to a function, they always try to get a piece,” said Holyfield.

She is also well known for her wit. A white man once visited Jackson and tried to sell her a picture of Dr. King.

“I ran him away from here,” said Jackson. “Y’all done killed him and now you are trying to get rich of his pictures. They killed him, but now they hate that they did.”

When asked if she would march again for the right to vote, Jackson, who attended the 35th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, and actually shook President Clinton’s hand, quickly said “oh yes!”

Even though she is one of the oldest living voting rights marchers, Jackson said she simply wants to be remembered as being a Christian.