Rev. F.D. Reese’s grandsons are ensuring his impact is never forgotten

Decades later, Alan Reese and his brother, Marvin are working to keep their grandfather’s name alive by organizing tours all over Selma, detailing who their grandfather was, his significance to the area and how his work helped create change for Black people in Selma and elsewhere in the country.
The brothers run the tours “every other weekend right now,” said Marvin Reese, 39. “When we first started it wasn’t as often but now it’s building up momentum.”
The F.D. Reese Historical Tour, named for their grandfather who died in 2018 at the age of 88, takes tourists and local residents of all ages and races to historic sites throughout Selma that played a significant role in Reese’s life — starting with his home. After taking groups through their grandfather’s home, the Reeses move on to R.B. Hudson High School, a former segregated school where Reese planned the Teacher’s March in 1965.
Frederick Reese, who was a graduate of Alabama State University and an educator for more than 50 years, said in a 2004 interview that Black teachers in Selma “did not really understand the influence they had in the community as an organization” he said. This was why he believed they made such perfect activists in the civil rights movement.
Civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. kneels in prayer with the Rev. F.D. Reese and others before going to jail in Selma, Ala. They were arrested on Feb. 1, 1965, after protesting Alabama’s voter registration requirements. Following the prayer, they all marched peacefully to jail. Bettmann Archive
The next destination is Clark Elementary School, where Reese led more than 100 teachers to the Dallas County Courthouse. There, Reese and other teachers peacefully protested for the right of Black citizens to vote.
“There were deputies across the door with their billy clubs, with their guns,” Reese said. “And the vicious sheriff, Jim Clark — who at that time was a symbol of resistance in the South — and he gave the orders for us to get off of those steps, that we were making a mockery of his courthouse. And we reminded him that that courthouse also belonged to us.”
Reese was president of the Dallas County Voters League, a “particularly instrumental” organization in seeking to register Black voters in Selma before the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965, said Adam Green, an associate professor of American history at the University of Chicago.
“It’s important that we find ways to raise up the story of Dr. Reese and others, and convey a sense that their personal stories are the stories of the history of the civil rights movement, and what they risked,” Green said. “And what they put on the line is something that needs to be commemorated in the same sort of way that we commemorate members of the military and first responders today within the United States, because they built and defended the country, as surely as anybody who took up arms does.”
Alan Reese, left, and Marvin Reese with their grandfather, the Rev. F.D. Reese, center, at church. Family photo
After visiting the courthouse, the Reeses’ tour continues to the Brown Chapel AME. Church, where marchers prepared for what became known as Bloody Sunday in which police officers attacked and beat more than 600 protesters marching across the Edmund Pettus Bridge. The bridge, named after a state Ku Klux Klan leader and where the Reeses conclude their tour, became one of the most important landmarks of the civil rights movement. While the tour is designed to last an hour and a half, the Reeses said it often goes longer — up to three hours — because participants have so many questions.
“They always say, ‘Wow,’” Alan Reese said, “Like, ‘why haven’t I heard of this man?’”
Leaders like King or politician and civil rights activist John Lewis, who served in the U.S. House of Representatives for 33 years, have become symbols of the movement, “rather than thinking about people that were organizers, and people who exemplified things that moved members of the community,” Green said. Over time, Green said, contributions from people like Reese have simply faded from memory.
To counter that, the Reeses strive to get their grandfather’s name widely known and honored. Alan Reese said he encouraged his grandfather to write his autobiography, “Selma’s Self Sacrifice,” which was published one year after his death. The Reeses have also visited schools in Selma and across the nation to teach students about Reese and his work. They also hold weekly discussions on a program called “The Lineage Podcast,” where they “fill in certain holes of the civil rights movement.”
The Rev. F.D. Reese, second from right, marches with a large group of students and civil rights activists over the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala., March 8, 2010. Jamie Martin / AP file
Reminders of Reese are sprinkled throughout Selma, including the Frederick D. Reese Parkway and F.D. Reese Street. The city also commemorates Reese every March during F.D. Reese Day. Now, Alan and Marvin Reese hope to get a school named in his honor and are working on a documentary about their grandfather.
And with all the work that they’re doing, the Reeses say they know their grandfather would be proud.
“I always say that I feel honored to even be connected to a part of history that a lot of people are yearning for,” Marvin Reese said. “And they have an appetite for it.”