By Spessard Stone
At Mims on Christmas night, 1951, the home of Harry T. Moore, was bombed by Klansmen. Moore,
executive secretary of the Florida conference of the NAACP from June 1946 to November 1951, was
killed, and his wife, Harriett, died ten days later.Robert W. Saunders, a 31-year-old Tampa native, living in Detroit, was in August 1952 appointed by Walter White as Moore's successor as field secretary, a position he would hold until March 1966 when he became chief of the Civil Rights Division of the Office of Economic Opportunity in Atlanta.
Saunders in his autobiography, Bridging The Gap Continuing The Florida NAACP Legacy of Harry T. Moore 1952-1966, chronicles his life and times as a leader in the Florida civil rights movement.
Young Saunders came of age in a mixed race Tampa neighborhood where all children played together, but there were two distinct societies--one white, one black. Although Jim Crow prevailed with its pervasive racism, there was a thriving colored business district and dedicated teachers, ministers, and other mentors, including his activist maternal grandmother, who was a founder of a 1915 NAACP chapter in West Tampa.
Saunders came under the influence of Mary McLeod Bethune while attending Bethune-Cookman College, from which he departed to serve during World War 11 in the Army Air Corps at Tuskegee.
Journeying north, he, after a stint as a journalist in Cincinnati, received his B. A. in January 1951 from Detroit Institute of Technology. While working at a Ford Motor plant, he became active in the union, NAACP, and also attended law school.
Accepting the position of field secretary of the Florida NAACP, Saunders moved back to Tampa where for over thirteen years he would lead a dauntless fight for civil rights.
Presented are such major events as many of the legal suits initiated by the NCAAP, relevant state and federal rulings, various state legislative committees (including the Johns Committee), the Tallahassee Bus Boycott of May 1956, and the St. Augustine Demonstrations.
Featured also are the organization of local NAACP chapters and their leaders, of whom the clergy exercised a position of prominence.
Mr. Saunders gives candid opinions on political leaders, including Governors Charley E. Johns, LeRoy Collins, Farris Bryant, Hayden Burns, and Claude Kirk. Scathed is Willis McCall, the infamous sheriff of Lake County.
Bridging The Gap preserves the legacy of African Americans in Florida as experienced by one of the state's leading NAACP veterans and will serve as a seminar for all interested in Florida's past.
Bridging The Gap contains 319 pages, including appendices, notes, bibliography and index, plus over 160 photographs and illustrations. It can be obtained from the University of Tampa Press, 401 West Kennedy Boulevard, Tampa, FL 33606.
This review was published in The Herald-Advocate (Wauchula, Fla.) of June 15, 2000.
SAUNDERS, Robert W., SR., died March 18, 2003. Funeral services for Human Rights Leader, Mr. Robert W. Saunders, Sr., will be held tomorrow (Monday), March 24, 2003 at 11 a.m., at St. Paul A.M.E. Church, 506 E. Harrison St., downtown Tampa. Interment will be made in Florida National Cemetery. In lieu of flowers, please make any contributions to St. Paul A.M.E. Church. John Harmon, L.F.D., James Harmon, L.F.D., Burial.
January 11, 2001 & music = "We Shall Overcome." Obituary added April 13, 2003.