Dan Warren

Lawton Chiles Center for Florida History Welcomes Dan Warren

LAKELAND, Fla. (Feb. 9, 2010) --Florida Southern Colleges Lawton Chiles Center for Florida History welcomes Daytona Beach attorney Dan Warren, the author of "If It Takes All Summer," an insider's view to one of America's most important civil rights struggles. His lecture, "If it Takes all Summer: Martin Luther King, the KKK, and States Rights in St. Augustine, 1964," begins at 7 p.m. Feb. 25 in the William M. Hollis Seminar Room of the Thad Buckner Building on the FSC campus. The event is free and open to the public.

Warren, a lawyer in Daytona Beach, entered public life in 1961 when Gov. Farris Bryant appointed him the State Attorney. In the summer of 1964, Warren was special counsel to the governor and charged with quelling racial tensions in St. Augustine. Working diligently with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and local officials, Warren cracked down on Ku Klux Klan violence and pushed integration on reluctant public officials. Ignoring threats from the Klan and political repercussions, Warren proceeded to afford protection for civil rights demonstrators.

After he resigned from office in 1968, Warren returned to his law practice and spent much of the remainder of his career defending the rights of others, especially minorities. He has written extensively on constitutional rights, especially the First Amendment (free speech and free press), Fourth Amendment (unlawful search and seizure) and Fifth Amendment (self-incrimination). He has received the NAACP Trail Blazer Award and the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Civil Rights Award.

His 2007 book, "If it Takes all Summer," won the Florida Historical Societys Harry T. Moore Award, named for an African-American schoolteacher and civil rights activist who was killed when his house was bombed on Christmas Night, 1951.

"Dan Warren is a living, breathing American hero. He was not only an observer; he was a participant, in one of the most significant Civil Rights struggles in American history. The St. Augustine Movement forced a reluctant Congress to act to guarantee equal access to public facilities as enshrined in the Civil Rights Act of 1964," says Dr. James M. Denham, director of the Lawton Chiles Center for Florida History.

For more information, please contact the Lawton Chiles Center for Florida History at 863.680.3001.