Lecture on Bayard Rustin

Historian John D'Emilio will give a talk "Civil Rights Pioneer Bayard Rustin," at 7:30 p.m., Thursday, April 26, in Kresge Hall, Ford Center for the Fine Arts, Knox College, Galesburg, Illinois. The lecture is free and open to the public.

D'Emilio is professor of history and director of the gender and women's studies program at the University of Illinois at Chicago. D'Emilio is the author of "Lost Prophet: The Life and Times of Bayard Rustin," a biography of Rustin that has been nominated for the National Book Award.

A civil rights activist for more than 50 years, Rustin worked with the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), helped organize "freedom rides" to protest racial discrimination in public transportation and to bring participants to the 1963 "March on Washington," where Martin Luther King delivered his famous "I Have A Dream" speech.

D'Emilio also has studied Rustin's activities in union organizing, the anti-apartheid movement, and the gay rights movement. D'Emilio's books on sexuality include "The World Turned: Essays on Gay History, Politics and Culture," "Sexual Politics, Sexual Communities," "Intimate Matters: A History of Sexuality in America" and "Creating Change: Sexuality, Public Policy, and Civil Rights."