Nashville’s Diane Nash to Receive Medal of Freedom - Articles

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Posted by: Stacey Shrader Joslin on Jul 6, 2022

In addition to honoring civil rights attorney Fred Gray, President Joe Biden will present the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Nashville civil rights icon Diane Nash at a ceremony tomorrow, WKRN reports. Nash came to Nashville in 1959 to study at Fisk University and became a leader in nonviolent protests that desegregated the city's lunch counters. She helped found the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and participated in the Freedom Rides. Nash also worked closely with Martin Luther King Jr., who described her as the “driving spirit in the nonviolent assault on segregation at lunch counters.”