ATLANTA — For nearly a century, civil rights activist Xernona Clayton has dedicated her life to serving her community.
Clayton, 95, helped the late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. plan marches. She was there when Coretta Scott King learned her husband had been fatally shot at the Lorraine Hotel in April 1968.
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Channel 2′s Karyn Greer joined Clayton and staff at Georgia Natural Gas on Wednesday to share stories about her fight for civil rights, including her work with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the National Urban League and other organizations.
“We need the presence of someone like Ms. Clayton here today probably more than ever. So many of the things that resonated in previous decades seem to resonate even now,” Maurice Baker with Georgia Natural Gas said.
Over the decades, she has received hundreds of honors and accolades.
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In 2023, the City of Atlanta unveiled a statue of her in the Xernona Clayton Plaza on West Peachtree Street. It sits down the street from a hotel she was thrown out of during the civil rights movement.
“I kind of wish we could come together as a varied group of people. But sometimes I’m having the same ideas. Just because you have one color or another doesn’t mean we can’t think alike sometimes or share the thinking alike on an issue. We could do better, and I wish we would,” Clayton said.
Even now, she’s still serving her community. On her birthday every year, she still hands out food and clothes to the homeless.
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