(April 2, 1940 – March 31, 2014)
from The Greenwood Project
Daughter of Dr. Matthew Walker Sr., Maxine was a Fisk University student when she participated in non-violence training under Rev. James Lawson. A widely-published photograph showed her sitting apprehensively at a Nashville lunch counter as a mob attacked another protester, Paul Laprad, behind her. Both Maxine and LaPrad (although not their assailants) were arrested that day. A prostitute jailed with the female students taught them how to shield themselves from leering guards when using the open toilet in their cell. Maxine worked together with many of the iconic figures of the Civil Rights Movement, including John Lewis, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall. She later earned a chemistry degree from Fisk, married Brandford Giddings, and brought up three children. After her children were grown, Mrs. Giddings earned a Master’s degree from Kent State and achieved distinction as an innovative instructor of computer technology, publisher of a civil rights veterans’ newsletter, and an election judge.
College student Maxine Walker (at right in light-colored coat) sits quietly at a Nashville lunch counter as fellow protester Paul LaPrad is pulled from his seat and violently attacked. (The Tennessean, February 28, 1960. Fair use.)
____________________
The Greenwood Project is a series of 160-word biographies of individuals who lie at rest in Mt. Ararat and Greenwood cemeteries, two historic African American burial grounds in Nashville, Tennessee. The project, which began in September 2014 (and is still available on Facebook, at https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064806156276), shares the stories of more than 300 consequential individuals, primarily African American, who changed the course of city, state, and national history through their words and deeds. (All biographies were written by Kathy Lauder unless otherwise noted.)
Nashville Historical Newsletter 