The Elmore Bolling Initiative

06/02/2026

05/21/2026

04/17/2026

We’re excited to officially announce the date of this year’s Third Biennial Gala!

Join us on October 23 for an evening of reflection, storytelling, and community as we honor history and invest in the future.

More details to come—but for now, save the date.

12/05/2025

12/04/2025

Today we mark the anniversary of the lynching of Elmore Bolling — a devoted father of seven and accomplished Black businessman whose life was taken on December 4, 1947 in Lowndes County, Alabama.

Bolling built thriving businesses, created jobs for his neighbors, and uplifted an entire community during some of the harshest years in the Jim Crow South. His success—and his refusal to accept second-class status—made him a target. On this day, white men murdered him in broad daylight and tried to hide behind lies meant to protect their power and erase his legacy.

We remember Elmore Bolling not only for the brutal injustice of his death, but for the fullness of his life: his generosity, his leadership, and his unwavering commitment to helping others rise with him. His story is a reminder that racial terror was often used to thwart Black opportunity and crush Black progress.

Today we honor his legacy, his family’s courage in asserting the truth, and the ongoing work of confronting a history that shaped — and continues to shape — the world we live in.

We remember. We say his name.
Elmore Bolling (1908–1947)

11/30/2025

On Giving Tuesday, please support The Elmore Bolling Initiative.

The link to donate is in the comments.

08/03/2025

Stewart's testimony described the widespread raw sewage crisis Alabamians are experiencing and informed the Senate Judiciary Committee on the continuing need for social justice to help people battling the decades-old problem still plaguing the area.

Read more at: https://www.lowndessignal.com/2025/08/01/stewart-testifies-to-funding-impact/
https://www.lowndessignal.com/2025/08/01/stewart-testifies-to-funding-impact

Alabama Senator Robert Stewart represented District 23 on Capitol Hill Wednesday, July 23, and testified in a hearing focused on the impact of recent Trump Administration funding cuts for DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion) programs to Black Belt constituents. His testimony described the widespread r...

07/25/2025

Elmore Bolling will be recognized as one of Alabama's civil rights martyrs at the 2025 Jonathan Daniels and the Martyrs of Alabama Pilgrimage in Hayneville on Saturday, August 9 sponsored by The Episcopal Church in Alabama
The pilgrimage begins at 11 a.m. with a procession from the town square to the historic county jail, where Daniels, a white Episcopal seminarian from Massachusetts, was held after being arrested for protesting segregation and Jim Crow violence in Fort Deposit. The procession then moves to the site of the former Varner’s Cash Store, where Daniels was killed, and concludes at the Lowndes County Courthouse with a service of Holy Communion held in the same courtroom where Daniels’ killer was acquitted by an all-white jury.
Register today for this powerful witness to faith, justice, and remembrance. Link in comments.