BEL AIR, Feb. 9, 2023 — I had the opportunity to attend an award ceremony for Janice East Moorehead Grant, 89, where she received the first Harford County Civil Rights Leadership Award from Harford Community College.
In the 1950s and 1960s, Mrs. Grant led various efforts to support civil rights in northeastern Maryland. These included protests for fair housing, open schools, and greater economic equality through employment, and she was arrested twice for her activism.
She also led efforts to desegregate Route 40 and joined the 1961 Freedom Riders on the Maryland highway. One of the earliest campaigns of the Freedom Riders focused on the highway in northeastern Maryland and Delaware.
In 1964, she participated in the Mississippi Freedom Summer effort to register voters and set up “Freedom Schools in the State. Later she joined the Peace Corps and served as a teacher in Liberia, where she earned one of her three master’s degrees.
On February 21, WMAR’s Kelly Swoope aired a segment about the civil rights leader’s accomplishments and the honor she received at the College.
Here’s the piece that aired in Baltimore.