It was revealed over the course of the trial that Michael was bisexual and had been corresponding with a male sex worker, even making plans to meet up. Ann Atwater and Claiborne P. Ellis had much in common, although it would take years of battling each other across the racial divide before they were able to see their similarities. They showed community members how to cultivate gardens or how to chip in and fundraise together to improve their neighborhoods. An Alford plea is one where the defendant admits that the evidence against them would likely lead to a finding of guilty, but the defendant asserts their innocence. As seen in The Staircase on HBO Max, Caitlin's opinion changed after she saw autopsy pictures showcasing the severity of Kathleen Peterson's injuries and after learning of Michael Peterson's bisexuality. In July 1971, the public schools were still segregated, despite the 1954 US Supreme Court ruling that segregated schools were unconstitutional, and 1960s federal civil rights legislation about integration of public facilities. Ellis quit the KKK. So, where are Michael Peterson's children now? She said, "I realized there was definitely another side to him.". He stayed in touch with me; I'd call him. Eventually Atwater divorced him and raised their two daughters on her own as a single mother. It was funded by the North Carolina Fund, a statewide program to improve education. She was born in Hallsboro, N.C., the daughter of sharecroppers. They don't have any evidence to some of the things that they do and some of the opinions they make. Gradually Atwater became a leader among the participants in Operation Breakthrough meetings. On the final night of the charrette, Ellis stood before the crowd and ripped up his Klan card. Hatin America is hard to do because you cant see it to hate it. I didn't like Ann boycotting stores. Margaret Ratliff and her young sister Martha Ratliff were adopted by Michael Peterson after their parents, Elizabeth and George Ratliff, died. Your address? When addressing black people, the workers would holler at them across the room, What you here for? This embarrassed the black client, who was forced to explain private issues in front of a room full of strangers. C.P. The only foods she could afford for her children were rice, cabbage, and fatback. She was a fierce fighter for rights for poor African Americans who shook up the white power establishment in Durham, N.C. in the 1960s. At one school meeting, a school board member got up in the middle of a conversation as she was making demands for school improvements. Atwater, the daughter of sharecroppers and a single mother of two, moved to Durham when she was about 18 and spent most of her life fighting for the rights of black and impoverished citizens in Durham. The two realized they had been arguing about the wrong things, that they had the same hopes for their children and a lot in common as poor people. Ms. ATWATER: Well, in the first five days of the meetings, we had a choir come in, a gospel choir, a church choir--to come in and do some singing. Though going through the trial was unimaginably difficult, Atwater did tell IndyWeek that it gave her a measure of understanding. Ellis told an NPR interviewer that Atwater was an effective boycotter, making progress and he hated her guts. She moved to Durham in 1953, where her husband, William French, had relocated. Ellis died last week in Durham at the age of 78. What Happened To Ann Atwater Today, Caitlin is married and is now known as Caitlin Clark. Breakthrough was a project designed to alleviate poverty by teaching residents how to address its root causes, and by organizing the community to create a social security net. At first, Caitlin supported her step-father and told the press after his arrest: "My mother and Mike had an absolutely loving relationship and there is no way that either of them would ever wish any sort of harm on the other one.". It was during this series of meetings in the summer of 1971 that C.P. WebAtwater lived in a dilapidated house on an unpaved street in Durhams Hayti district, where she struggled to support her two daughters. For food, she and her daughters could only afford rice, cabbage, and gravy while she made her daughters clothes out of the bags the rice came in. It seems an unlikely end for a sharecroppers daughter who had taken food from the farmers back door and who had internalized that she came second. Mr. C.P. As a result, there was no one to direct the Klan's Youth Corp and the program disbanded. Ellis were named co-chairs of the Durham, North Carolinas charrette S.O.S., Save Our Schools.. One of the workers said, Maam, this is the service for Clayborn Ellis. Welfare was only providing $57 a month, and she was leasing a dilapidated house where she was $100 behind her rent. He struggled to make ends meet and provide for his family. You gotta have somethin to look at to hate. To her knowledge, making demands from a landlord was unheard of and she had no idea that she had the right to do so. He was upset and I was upset, and he was cussin' and callin' all black folks n**gers and I was callin' all white folks crackers, and I couldn't stand white folks anyway." Today, Margaret resides in California, and Martha relocated to Colorado. The Best of Enemies true story reveals that Ann Atwater got married at the age of 14 and moved to Durham, NC in 1953. It was at this house in Durhams Hayti District where she met Howard Fuller, the man that would help her reach her destiny as a pioneering advocate. Over 10 days, the opposing sides met and tension grew. She didnt know you could ask for repairs. Her mother died when she was 6. All rights reserved. Today, he lives in Maryland with his two children, according to The News and Observer. Before the trial, Ratliff's body was exhumed and autopsied, at which point a second autopsy suggested that she, too, had suffered head trauma, according to CNN. Newsweek He got up in the middle of their conversation, ignoring Atwater and the crowd of black parents behind her. 2023 BDG Media, Inc. All rights reserved. C.P. Ellis, Ann Atwater's voice was deep and powerful, and she had the ability to energize her audience. She wrote in a column that a couple of years before that committee she nearly slit his throat at a city meeting after he repeatedly used the n-word. Ultimately, the school board disregarded the proposals put forth by the charrette, but the friendship C.P. Kevin Washington, C. The poor blacks of Durham had to fight both racial and class divisions: one against the whites who claimed superiority and another against the wealthier blacks who did not want to associate themselves with the lower class. She even experienced racism in that moment, when a funeral home worker doubted she knew the deceased. [7][pageneeded] Afterward she attended the Operation Breakthrough meeting and discussed how the poor had to work together to get the government's attention in order to help solve poverty and what her concerns were. BLOCK: Ann Atwater joins us from her home in Durham to share her memories of C.P. She had already been friends with the girls when their parents met and connected. We saw that each other, you know, was making it. His turnabout came through a 10-day community meeting on school desegregation in 1971. In 1971 Atwater was asked to co-chair a group looking for answers for the problems of desegregation of Durham Schools. Ann Atwater, a black civil rights activist, talks about her friend. Throughout Michael Peterson's arrest, trial, and 17 years of appeals, the Peterson children remained divided over their father's innocence. BLOCK: You know, it seems like such an unlikely transformation. The next day Atwater and Fuller went to Atwater's landlord to demand repairs for her house and, to Atwater's surprise, her landlord agreed to fix some of the problems. At the time, Durham had a fairly large black population, with a considerable portion of educated, middle-class blacks, in addition to white residents and poor blacks. Ann Atwater was born in 1935 in Hallsboro, North Carolina as one of nine children to parents who were sharecroppers; her father was also a deacon of the church. was sitting there, and first he started clapping his hands. The purpose of this charrette was to discuss school desegregation, a still contentious issue, and to draw up a series of recommendations to present to the school board. 25 Of Our Favorite Mothers Day Episodes From 'The Golden Girls' to 'Rugrats', It's Official! Atwater said that she refused to go to the first meeting, but her boss in the housing authority told her she'd lose her job if she didn't show up. I pulled out the knife that I kept in my hand bag and opened the blade. Ellis did rip up his KKK card, swearing I never did go back to the Klan after I left that school program.. Like his older brother Clayton, Todd Peterson stood by his father's side during the trial and today. -An Unlikely Friendship Documentary. I didn't like integration. Ellis, who died of Alzheimer's in 2005, became a champion of union and labor organizations, working as an AFL-CIO organizer. Sadly, Elizabeth would die soon after in 1985 and Michael Peterson became the guardian of her two children. The program helped people gain confidence through a series of tasks to build achievement. By 1967 she was employed by the United Organization for Community Improvement and was chair of the Housing Committee. Me and him was over there mad with each other, but we wasn't getting anything done that the children wanted. When approached by Howard Fuller to join Operation Breakthrough, a program to help people escape poverty, Atwater found her life purpose. There certainly is no deep seated love between Mr. Ellis and myself but this school project brings out problems we all have. Ellis indeed started tapping his feet and then clapping his hands along with the others. She was one of those legendary black women in the South who was simply fearless when facing white oppression. She was taught that whites were better and that their needs came before hers. He credited his meetings with Ann Atwater as being the reason he was able to shed his racism. Ellis, an exalted cyclops of the local Ku Klux Klan in Durham. I began to blame it on black people. He was chosen to chair the meetings, along with his polar opposite, a militant African-American leader of Durham's civil rights movement, Ann Atwater. We looked at each other. Ann Atwater Ellis had an especially difficult time returning to his life post-charrette, as he had lost his effectiveness in the conservative community, which he acknowledged in a toast on the last night of the charrette. BLOCK: Civil rights activist Ann Atwater in Durham, North Carolina. However, the prosecution did not accuse Peterson of Elizabeth Ratliff's death at his trial. The experience inspired her to become involved in housing advocacy herself. Do you look back, and does it make sense to you? The kids in some of the schools were also being taught material that was a year behind what kids their same age were being taught in other schools. As an adult, he worked as a service station attendant before saving up enough money to buy a small service station in a factory town. But Atwater's husband struggled financially, and became alcoholic and abusive. But both Ann Atwater and C.P. She spoke at C.P. In the 1960s, eighty percent of black Durham residents lived in substandard housing, a figure which had remained unchanged since the 1920s. He organized a federally-funded sit-down which would rule on the issue one way or another, held for 10 days from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Atwater was chosen as one of the charrettes leaders. She organized her community to rail against the citys repressive and reprehensible policies towards black housing, often peacefully in pickets and marches and city council meetings, but she was not averse to more violent tactics, as when she participated in the bombing of the Housing Authority. Starting from the very beginning, Ann Atwater was born in Hallsboro as one of nine children and got married in her early teenage years. Despite the suspicions surrounding their mother's death, Margaret and Martha Ratliff continued to support Michael Peterson, believing he did not kill Kathleen. When Atwater discovered caseworkers kept key information from clients, she figured out how to get the information herself. In an NPR interview in 1996, C.P. Ann Atwater, interview by Jennifer Fiumara and Mary Cleary, The Southern Oral History Program at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, December 7, 1995. -An Unlikely Friendship Documentary, Yes. I had to hate somebody. C.P. Ellis Says Klan Days Have Been Over for Awhile,, This page was last edited on 1 February 2022, at 22:25. Riddick set up a meeting, which is referred to in the movie as a charrette. Ellis, read about Malcolm Xs brutal assassination and Americas struggle for civil rights. Ellis, a local Klan leader, focuses on a 10-day charrette, a community meeting that was organized in 1971 to grapple with the issue of school desegregation. Welfare was only providing $57 a month, and she was leasing a dilapidated house where she was $100 behind her rent. When Atwater had first met C. P. Ellis at a previous Durham city council meeting, she felt great resentment toward him. I hated her guts., BlacKkKlansman: How black detective Ron Stallworth infiltrated the Colorado Klan, Atwater countered: I hated him just as hard as he hated me. WebAnn Atwater Born: July 1, 1935 Growing up as the youngest of nine children, Ann started working on the family farm in Columbus County, N.C., before she can remember. She was a fierce fighter for rights for poor African Americans who shook up the white power establishment in Durham, N.C. in the 1960s. C.P. Like all historical fiction, the 2019 film The Best of Enemies takes a bit of license with reality. All rights reserved. And she was an effective boycotter, too. But my pastor was sitting there and saw me holding the knife. When her job as a maid ended, she found herself living in a dilapidated house in North Durham on a As seen in The Staircase documentary on Netflix, Clayton's first son Dorian visits Michael Peterson in prison as a baby and towards the end of the documentary, his wife Becky is seen pregnant with their second child, Lucien. I feel that when somebody calls me for some help, God wants me to go on record sayin' I tried. Any discussion of the matter ended bogged down in a bureaucratic cycle of commissions, committees, councils, boards of inquiry, official investigations, delegations, panels a endless substitution of talk for action. Atwater, emboldened by community organizer Howard Fuller, discovered a passion for housing reform and a natural talent for leadership first with Operation Breakthrough, then as chairwoman for the United Organizations for Community Improvement. This article was published more than4 years ago. Ann Atwater found her voice as a community activist to stand up to slumlords and bigots and yet, one of the most transformative relationships in her life was with a Klansman. Groups, Social Justice. Ellis, "and I particularly didn't want it at the time, but then I knew we were going to have to be at one school and the children had to get the best education they could. I did lose my family and my home." They got all the good jobs and youre all sittin here letting em do it. He said that black people should stay on the other side of the railroad because they had no business in town. Her first baby died soon after birth. They also raised Margaret and Martha Ratliff, the daughters of their friends George and Elizabeth Ratliff. I always said if they'd said something to me, I was going to knock the hell out of them with my Bible. She was a poor black woman raising children alone in the South in the mid-20th century. However, Yes, this comes straight from Diane Bloom's 2002 documentary, No. Ann's daughter's school catches on fire, and C.P. Following his nearly two-week long meeting with Ann Atwater, C.P. She died in 2016 having won many awards and accolades for her work for the disadvantaged. Ann G. Atwater was born on July 1, 1935, in Hillsboro, North Carolina. She showed that it was possible for whites and blacks, even with conflicting views, to negotiate and collaborate by establishing some common ground. Ann Atwater organizes neighbors after completing Community Action Training with the North Carolina Fund. I didn't like the demonstrations downtown. The defense team claimed Kathleen was aware of Michael's sexuality and was fine with it, but Atwater did not believe her mother would have been accepting. Functionality of the site should not be affected, but things may look different. That first meeting marked the start of her involvement in helping the poor black community fight poverty. NBC News reported that after seeing Kathleen's autopsy photos, Atwater called Margaret and said: The sisters stopped speaking after that. The Staircase on HBO Max delves deep into the story of Michael Peterson, who was convicted of killing his wife Kathleen Peterson on December 9, 2001. Atwater fought against the lack of respect that many whites showed blacks. For food, she and her daughters could only afford rice, cabbage, and gravy while she made her daughters clothes out of the bags the rice came in. Kathleen's body was found at the foot of the stairs, with trauma to her head that indicated she may have been struck. Todd Peterson is the second son of Michael Peterson, from his first marriage to Patricia Sue. On the evening of her death, the Petersons had dinner with Ratliff and her daughters. When Ellis, who later became a labor rights activist, died in 2005, his family asked Atwater to give the eulogy. Durham Civil Rights activist Ann Atwater best known for the relationship she forged with her biggest enemy, a member of the Ku Klux Klan has died. Her goal was to teach the people the necessary skills to survive. Fuller looked at the house and asked Atwater if shed like help in fixing it. Such a system is still in use today. "We went to the schoolhouse and we found out that the teachers there were out of their field," recalled Atwater. Kathleen Peterson Aiden Shaw Makes His Return In 'And Just Like That' Season 2, 15 Movies On Netflix About Mothers & Daughters Thatll Make You Emotional, Beef Captures Our Toxic Tendency To Confuse Love With Sacrifice, What Parents Are Talking About Delivered Straight To Your Inbox, By subscribing to this BDG newsletter, you agree to our. They settled the suit for $25 million and Atwater said, according to WRAL: Atwater has suffered an unimaginable loss, but hopefully has been able to find peace in the intervening years. In October 2002, acting as administrator of her mother's estate, Caitlin Atwater filed a wrongful death claim in a civil case against Michael Peterson. She was a woman who found and used the power of her voice. www.schoolforconversion.orgAnn Atwater organizes neighbors after completing Community Action Training with the North Carolina Fund. I went on back out the street and went on down, right back down the street to the office, and we Xeroxed the part that told the welfare recipients their rights.. "They would turn their chairs around, and they were chairs that wheeled around. He invited Atwater to a meeting and to join. We were at a meeting downtown together, said Ann Atwater years later, and he kept yelling nigger this and nigger that. ", Ann Atwater continued her work fighting for racial equality as a grass roots organizer, passing away in 2016. Ellis had a change of heart after a 10-day forum on integration of schools in Durham, N.C. Ann Atwater and C.P. Elliss position at the margins of white society frustrated him, and looking for a scapegoat, he turned to the target provided by the Klan, as he explained in a 1980 interview with oral historian Studs Terkel: I really began to get bitter. Caitlin Atwater was the daughter of Kathleen and her first husband, Fred Atwater, though she was very close with the entire Peterson family. Civil rights activist and former Ku Klux Klansman C.P.

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