Joanne Blackmon Bland is the co-founder and former director of the Naitonal Voting Rights Museum in Selma, Alabama. She was a highly active participant in the Civil Rights Movement from her earliest days, and at age 8 was the youngest person to have been jailed during any civil rights demonstration during that period. By the time she was 11 years old, Bland had been arrested a documented 13 times.

Lynda Blackmon Lowery marched on “Bloody Sunday” and “Turn Around Tuesday,” and is the youngest marcher to walk every step of the successful march from Selma to Montgomery. Her involvement in the civil rights movement has been the foundation for her work throughout her life. She is the author of the illustrated memoir “Turning 15 On The Road To Freedom: My Story of the 1965 Selma Voting Rights March.”