Bob Zellner

John Robert Zellner (born April 5, 1939) is an American civil rights activist. He graduated from Huntingdon College in 1961 and that year became a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) as its first white field secretary. Zellner was involved in numerous civil rights efforts, including nonviolence workshops at Talladega College, protests for integration in Danville, Virginia, and organizing Freedom Schools in Greenwood, Mississippi, in 1964. He also investigated the murders of Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner that summer.

Zellner was arrested and severely beaten for his activism several times. He left SNCC in 1967 but continued his civil rights activism. He later taught the history of the civil rights movement at Long Island University and published a memoir of his activism that was adapted into the 2020 film Son of the South, with Lucas Till portraying him. Zellner was arrested as recently as 2013, for protesting a North Carolina voter ID law.

Early life and education John Robert Zellner was born to James Abraham Zellner and Ruby Hardy Zellner on April 5, 1939, in Jay, Florida. Efn|Some sources state that he was born in Alabama, He grew up in Alabama, the second oldest of five children. His relatives were involved in the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) and his father and grandfather were members. Zellner's father organized for the white supremacist group but eventually left the Klan after supporting Jewish resistance in Nazi dominated eastern Europe during the 1930s, prior to World War II. A pivotal experience was traveling through Russia with a Black gospel group while evangelizing. After James left the KKK, Zellner's grandparents disowned their son. James then became a minister in the Methodist Church. Zellner graduated from Huntingdon with a degree in psychology and sociology later that year. Zellner later studied for a summer at the Highlander Folk School and two years at Brandeis University but did not graduate. Zellner was arrested again in January 1963 at Huntingdon College on charges of vagrancy, which was later changed to false pretenses. He was defended against a possible ten-year sentence by Clifford Durr and Charles Morgan Jr., and acquitted. After the Children's March in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1963 turned violent, Zellner and other activists went to the city. He attended the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963. Zellner was involved in nonviolence workshops at Talladega College, protests for integration in Danville, Virginia, and organizing Freedom Schools in Greenwood, Mississippi, in 1964 during the Freedom Summer, when he became close friends with Stokely Carmichael. He also investigated the murders of Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner with Rita Schwerner. In the 1970s he lectured at the National Institute for Minorities in China (now Minzu University of China). Zellner later described his involvement with SNCC as "the greatest thing that ever happened in my life."

Zellner published a memoir, The Wrong Side of Murder Creek, in 2011. The memoir inspired the 2020 film Son of the South, in which he was portrayed by Lucas Till.

Personal life Zellner has been married twice, first to Dorothy Zellner (from August 9, 1963) and later to Linda Miller.