Richard H. Harris

Richard Henry Harris, Jr. (August 22, 1918 – July 24, 1976) was a prominent civil rights leader and pharmacist. A personal friend, neighbor and collaborator of Dr Martin Luther King Jr. in Montgomery, Alabama, Harris was instrumental in three of the most seminal protests of the U.S. civil rights movement: the Freedom Riders, the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Selma to Montgomery marches. Harris's home, best known as the famed "Richard Harris House", was Montgomery's central command center and safe haven for beaten and bloodied Freedom Riders as they traveled to Jackson, Mississippi, amidst physically violent racial rioters, National Guard protection, and Alabama segregationist authorities’ call for martial law.

In 2018, the World Monuments Fund (WMF) listed Harris’ home on its World Monuments Watch list of 20 threatened cultural sites not only for the potential risk to its physical structure, but the potential risk to its historical significance and backstory.

A former U.S. Army Air Force Captain, Harris was one of the U.S. military's first African-American combat fighter pilots, serving with the 332nd Fighter Group's 99th Fighter Squadron, best known as the Tuskegee Airmen, "Red Tails", or "Schwartze Vogelmenschen" ("Black Birdmen") among enemy German pilots.

Early life, education, family, personal life Harris was born on August 22, 1918, in Montgomery, Alabama. He was the son of Richard Henry Harris, Sr. (1888–February 1, 1944) and Evelyn "Everlena" Cook Jones (1884–1974). In 1907, Harris Sr founded and operated Dean Drug Store, Montgomery's oldest African-American drug store.

Harris attended Alabama State College laboratory school for primary and secondary school. The Harris Family later moved to Tuskegee, Alabama, where they lived with the Foster Family, the maternal grandparents of famed musical performer and songwriter Lionel Richie. The US Army Air Corps assigned Harris to the 332nd Fighter Group's 99th Fighter Squadron.

In 1946, the US Army Air Corps discharged Harris with the rank of captain. The National Guard brought the wounded Freedom Riders to Harris’ home where Harris fed them and provided them with medicines.

Civil rights leaders Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Rev. Ralph D. Abernathy, James Farmer, John Lewis, and Diane Nash met at Harris's home to develop strategy to buffer and support the Freedom Riders' protests. The fund added Harris’ home to its registry not only because of potential risk to the home's structure, but the potential risk of the home's history during the Civil rights movement.