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By the mid-20th century, racial tensions had escalated and demonstrations swelled for voting rights and school integration. Beginning with the Montgomery bus boycott in 1955 lead by Reverend Martin Luther King, conflicts between the Civil Rights movement and those who would fight to maintain "the white way of life" would lead to violence and, in some cases, murder. Between 1948 and 1965, over two hundred Black churches and homes in the Deep South were the target of …

…educational advancement. But, most important, blacks themselves realized that their historical experience and their culture could best be remembered if they, under certain conditions, remained separated from the mainstream of the larger society. And so, although Jim Crow cast a wide and ugly shadow across New Jersey for most of the State's history, blacks accomplished the great feat of keeping alive those things they most admire in themselves by keeping quietly and honorably to themselves.