James Orange

James Edward Orange was born in Birmingham, Alabama, but moved to Atlanta, Georgia in the early 1960s. Orange, at over tall He was also known for preaching and singing in a strong baritone voice. Orange had a large family, several of whom were active in the civil rights movement. He was the third of his parents' seven children. His father worked in the large ACIPCO foundry in Birmingham, but was fired in 1957 for union activity. Orange's mother was very active in the Civil Rights Movement and also attended the Monday night mass meetings at the Sixteenth Street church. Still, he told an interviewer on January 15, 2000, "I was afraid to go home and tell my mamma that her daughters, one 17 and the other 14, were in jail. But that's the way it was in those days, as we waged — and won — a non-violent campaign against police clubs and police dogs." ==Civil rights era==

Speaking 1993, Andrew Young called Orange one of the "real soldiers of the movement ... a gentle giant." In 1963, working as a chef in Birmingham, Orange wasn't involved heavily in Civil Rights. When he was invited to attend a Civil Rights speech with a friend, he accepted. At the weekly Monday night mass meetings at the 16th Street Baptist Church, he was transfixed by a speech on equality by Ralph Abernathy. Once Orange heard Abernathy speak, his passion was ignited. He said, "...The longer I listened, the more intently I listened, I became absorbed in his message..." In a meeting in the church basement later that night, he volunteered to risk arrest picketing a local store the next day. He remarked later that he was probably assigned the task because of his massive size. He was arrested, the first of at least 104 arrests for picketing or acts of civil disobedience. Orange became involved with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) in Alabama, with fellow members as notable as Martin Luther King Jr. Additionally, Orange always called people that worked with him "leaders," even those who he was instructing. When asked about this, he said that calling everyone a leader anointed them with a mission to make the world more just. On one occasion, Orange attempted to separate a violent gang action by preaching a message of positivity and ended up with a broken nose. As part of his civil rights work for the SCLC in Alabama, he was arrested and jailed prior to conviction in 1965 for contributing to the delinquency of minors by enlisting them to work in voter registration drives and for encouraging them to sing freedom songs at the courthouse. His detention in Perry County, Alabama, sparked fears that he would be lynched, and a protest march was organized to support him. During that march on February 18, 1965, an Alabama state trooper fatally shot a young man, Jimmie Lee Jackson, in the stomach. In 2007, a former trooper named James B. Fowler, 74, was indicted for the death of Jackson. Living witnesses and tapes of the day of the killing were expected to be used at his trial. The 1965 uproar over Jackson's shooting during Orange's incarceration soon led to the famed Selma to Montgomery marches, including the infamous police brutality on "Bloody Sunday", and the passage of the Voting Rights Act later that year. In 1968, Orange was invited to attend the well-known Poor-People's Campaign, where thousands of homeless people camped out in front of the White House in an act of protest. That same year, Orange was standing at the bottom of the staircase of the Lorraine Hotel, only feet away from Martin Luther King Jr., who moments later, was shot and killed. ==Later work==

Orange was a project coordinator at the Southern Christian Leadership Conference from 1965 to 1970, then later became a regional coordinator with the AFL-CIO in Atlanta, Georgia. According to a fellow activist speaking shortly after his death, "He stayed active right up until the end... The Martin Luther King celebration this year fell on the 21st [of January, 2008]. He was still conducting it from his hospital bed. If you wanted something... he was still calling the shots." ==Death==

At the time of his death in February, 2008, at Atlanta's Crawford Long Hospital, Even on his deathbed, he was telling friends about more work they needed to do in the community to combat racial injustice. Orange's wife of 39 years, Cleophas, survived him, as did three daughters and a son. His youngest daughter, Pamela Aquica Orange, died on March 11, 2007. His daughter Jamida Orange spoke to the press on behalf of the family at the time of his death. ==In popular culture==

Orange is played in the 2014 film Selma by Omar Dorsey. ==See also==