Annual Prayer Breakfast Set for January 14 in New Student Center

DePaul University will honor the memory of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Jan. 14 with its annual prayer breakfast, to be held in the new Student Center, 2250 N. Sheffield Ave., Multipurpose Room, Suite 120. Diane Nash, a founding member and chairperson of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), is the special guest speaker, and Grammy-award- winning gospel singer Albertina Walker will perform.

Nash became involved in the civil rights movement as a student at Fisk University in 1959 when she chaired the student sit-in movement to desegregate lunch counters in Nashville, Tenn. Nash and her colleagues realized an important victory in 1960 when Nashville became the first southern city to desegregate lunch counters.

An indefatigable servant in the struggle for equality, Nash remained on the front lines of the movement for eight years as an organizer, coordinator and strategist. She was one of the coordinator’s of the Freedom Ride from Birmingham, Ala., to Jackson, Miss., in 1961. She served in several key capacities with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) from 1961 to 1965, and was appointed by President John F. Kennedy to a national committee to promote the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. She received the SCLC’s highest award, which was presented by King in 1965, for her work as a key strategist of the Selma Right-To-Vote movement. The Selma Right-To-Vote campaign was one of the major civil rights efforts that resulted in the Voting Rights Act.

Walker, a native Chicagoan, began singing at age four and organized her own gospel group, the Caravans, when she was 22. She has enjoyed an illustrious career as a solo artist, receiving numerous awards and honors, among them a 1995 Grammy for “Songs of the Church.” She will perform four selections during the DePaul breakfast program.

DePaul’s breakfast program in commemoration of King’s 73rd birthday is sponsored by the university’s Cultural Center. DePaul’s College of Law will co-sponsor with the Cultural Center a luncheon and lecture by Nash at noon in Room 9201 of the Egan Urban Center, 243 S. Wabash Ave. Both events are free and open to the public. To make reservations for the breakfast call Flora Anderson-Chestnut at 773/325-7759 by Jan. 7, 2002. Reservations for the luncheon should be made by calling Lawrence Arendt by Jan. 7 at 312/362-8450.