Albany, Georgia, 1962, Drinking Fountains in the Dougherty County Courthouse

Inspired by the political organizing and activist work of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) during his time as a student at the University of Chicago, Danny Lyon was subsequently sent by the group to Mississippi and Georgia in the summer 1962 to photograph their organizational efforts as well as the physical markers of segregation. As the late congressman and civil rights leader John Lewis described, “This young white New Yorker came South with a camera and a keen eye for history. And he used these simple, elegant gifts to capture the story of one of the most inspiring periods in America’s twentieth century.”