Andrew Goodman was a civil rights activist who became a martyr for the cause of racial justice during the 1960s. Born in 1943 in New York City, Goodman was a student at Queens College when he decided to join the effort to register African American voters in Mississippi, a state with entrenched racial discrimination. In the summer of 1964, he participated in the Freedom Summer campaign, an initiative organized by civil rights groups to combat voter suppression and segregation in the South. Along with fellow activists James Chaney and Michael Schwerner, Goodman traveled to the small town of Neshoba County, Mississippi, to investigate the burning of a Black church and to help register Black voters. Their efforts, however, were met with violent resistance from white supremacists.
On June 21, 1964, Goodman, Chaney, and Schwerner were kidnapped by members of the Ku Klux Klan, who later murdered them in a heinous act of racial terror. Their bodies were discovered several weeks later, and the incident became a pivotal moment in the civil rights movement, drawing national attention to the severe risks faced by activists in the South. Goodman’s death, alongside the deaths of Chaney and Schwerner, galvanized the movement and led to increased federal involvement in the fight for civil rights. Today, Andrew Goodman is remembered as a symbol of courage and sacrifice in the struggle for racial equality, and his legacy continues to inspire the fight for justice and human rights.