AARP, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR), and the Library of Congress welcome you to Voices of Civil Rights. We have collected and preserved thousands of personal stories and oral histories of the Civil Rights Movement, forming the world's largest archive of personal accounts of civil rights history. The entire collection eventually will be housed at the Library of Congress.

Voices of Civil Rights is a multifaceted project that has been featured in radio and television specials, traveling exhibits, educational programs, and grassroots events around the country. As part of the project, AARP has published My Soul Looks Back in Wonder: Voices of the Civil Rights Experience (Sterling, 2004), a volume of personal narratives collected by author Juan Williams with commentary by David Halberstam and Marian Wright Edelman. In 2005, the History Channel is airing a special documentary on the Voices of Civil Rights, based on stories collected from August to October 2004 during the unprecedented 70-day Voices of Civil Rights Bus Tour.

America’s civil rights story transcends race, age, gender and national origin.

This Voices of Civil Rights website features a searchable online archive of selected stories submitted by people from every corner of the country and from all walks of life. In addition, there are interactive features, essays, interviews, and special reports.

The era of struggle involving thousands of African Americans and others in the 1950s and 1960s was a pivotal period in civil rights history. It captivated the world and inspired millions. And yet America's civil rights story also includes those who battled discrimination in the decades before and after. It transcends race, age, gender, and national origin. Voices of Civil Rights hopes to preserve the entire story. It is our way of honoring the quest for freedom that continues to build the nation and change the world.