Civil Rights Superheroes: Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story February 10, 2010

The ToonSeum presents Civil Rights Superheroes, the first exhibition devoted primarily to Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story, a rare comic book from 1958. Supported by primary documents, including letters from Dr. King, A Walk To Freedom (a Civil Rights film from 1956), and editorial cartoons of the period, Civil Rights Superheroes shows how comic books and cartoons inspired everyday people to join the heroic Civil Rights Movement in the United States and how they continue to fuel international peace movements today.

Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story was a comic book like none other when it was first published in 1958. Commissioned by the pacifist organization Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR), Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story not only directly condemned race discrimination in the United States but also spurred social change in the American South. In contrast to the lurid true-crime comic books of the period or the innocuous Sunday funnies, this comic book highlighted the extraordinary feats of everyday superheroes: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the people of Montgomery. The setting was not a far way galaxy, but rather Montgomery, Alabama during the 381 days of the legendary Bus Boycott. Drawn by the Al Capp Organization (creators of L'il Abner) and written by a blacklisted comic book writer, the comic book not only traces King's life and the Bus Boycott, but serves as a primer in the history and techniques of non-violent resistance. This exhibition shows how the comic book drew from contemporary news and imagery to help mobilize a movement and to make Montgomery's story accessible to a wide audience. Although the comic book was distributed by churches, labor unions and civic organizations throughout the South during the 1950s and 1960s, very few original copies survive, due perhaps to its then controversial message and the civic activism that it promoted.

Despite outside efforts to curtail its influence, Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story has contributed to international social justices movements. It was distributed in South Africa as part of anti-Apartheid movement (and was banned as a result) in the 1960s and reprinted in Spanish for the peace movements in Latin America. Most recently, the comic book has been reprinted in Arabic, Farsi and Vietnamese and distributed throughout the Middle East and Southeast Asia to encourage contemporary student movements. Civil Rights Superheroes offers a rare glimpse of the comic book's history from production to censorship and worldwide impact.

In addition to Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story, this exhibition will also include reproductions of editorial cartoons by Herblock for The Washington Post about the Bus Boycott and contemporaneous editorial cartoons from the African-American press.

The exhibition was curated for the ToonSeum by Sylvia Rhor, Assistant Professor of Art History at Carlow University and independent curator. The exhibition draws from the archival material from Swarthmore College's Peace Collection.

This exhibition was made possible by support from the Grace Ann Geibel Institute for Justice and Social Responsibility at Carlow University, PNC Bank and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

The ToonSeum
945 Liberty Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15222
(412)232-0199

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Sunday, 11am-4pm

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For more information on special programming or to arrange a docent-led group tour, please content Joe Wos, Executive Director of the ToonSeum, ph: 412-232-0199 email: joe@toonseum.com

Official Website: http://www.toonseum.org