Voting Station

Unita Blackwell

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Advocate

The Resume

    (March 18, 1933-May 13, 2019)
    Born in Lula, Mississippi
    Project director for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
    Community development specialist for the National Council of Negro Women
    Organized voter registration drives in Mississippi
    Mayor of Mayersville, Mississippi (1977-2001)
    President of the National Conference of Black Mayors (1990-92)

Why she might be annoying:

    She was born with the name 'U.Z.,' which she kept until sixth grade when her teacher told her she needed 'a real name, not just initials.'
    Her activism helped break up her marriage to Jeremiah Blackwell: 'I guess I blossomed into the person that I really was or wanted to be.... And he just couldn't visualize that this was the person he had married.'
    She ran unsuccessfully for Congress (1992).
    While in Atlanta for ceremonies commemorating Martin Luther King, Jr, she disappeared from her hotel room (January, 2008); a day later she was discovered at the airport, and eventually diagnosed as being in the early stages of dementia.

Why she might not be annoying:

    Her parents were sharecroppers.
    She was arrested over 70 times for taking part in civil rights protests.
    She said, 'The more I heard about white people being so against it, the more I started thinking there must be something to this voting.'
    As mayor, she secured federal grants to provide Mayersville with police and fire protection, a public water system, paved streets, and housing for the elderly and disabled.
    While mayor at age 50, she enrolled in the University of Massachusetts, earning a master's degree in regional planning.
    She received a MacArthur Foundation 'Genius Grant' in recognition of her creative solutions to problems as mayor (1992).

Credit: C. Fishel


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    In 2023, Out of 1 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 2 Votes: 0% Annoying
    In 2021, Out of 6 Votes: 66.67% Annoying
    In 2020, Out of 2 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2019, Out of 99 Votes: 50.51% Annoying
    In 2018, Out of 20 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2017, Out of 40 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2016, Out of 10 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2015, Out of 288 Votes: 53.12% Annoying