- A longstanding myth is that the civil rights movement somehow bypassed Dallas, but that couldn't be further from the truth.

South Dallas specifically had a flourishing community of activists and organizers who fought tirelessly to push the needle towards a vision of radical liberation in a city.

Some have called the most racist city in the South.

- The, the actual reality is they suppress the history.

- I'm gonna stay here and teach this city a lesson.

We learned to be self-reliant.

We learned to be self-determined.

- There's a real revolution going on in this country today.

It is a black revolution.

- As early as the 1850s upper South Dallas was home to a small but thriving Jewish community.

In fact, the two mile stretch of road now named Martin Luther King Boulevard once contained one of the largest Jewish settlements in the south by 1950.

That was changing.

One of the driving forces was the education.

- The impact of the opening of Lincoln High School was that African Americans then from Joppa, try to move in closer to, to the high school.

- Prior to the opening of Lincoln High School, black students in Dallas County only had one high school.

They could attend Booker t Washington.

It had half the capacity needed, forcing students to cram their education into half days.

Lincoln High School's, 1939.

Opening in South Dallas was meant to be an answer to a growing problem.

As black people moved into South Dallas, white Christian and Jewish families moved out in droves.

Taking with them businesses and houses of worship, anti integrationists took drastic measures to try and prevent black people from moving in.

They protested the opening of Lincoln High School, some even terrorized black families who purchased homes near the school.

- There was essentially segregation mandated by law and segregation by practice, and it overlapped threat of neighbor violence, you know, blowing up houses.

That's a way to enforce racial boundaries that's not connected to the law.

- South Dallas had a sound back in those days, as you could hear, you know, when everything was quiet, you could hear from miles, and the only thing you could hear all night was the ice house pumping on second and Frank.

- Not long after Patterson and his family moved to South Dallas, the melodical sounds of the ice house were replaced with another more sinister sound.

- What would happen?

A house would become empty and they'd blow it up, keep somebody from moving into it - Again and again.

Throughout 1950 and 1951, the homes of black residents were blown up.

Sometimes multiple homes in a day, though a grand jury was convened after nearly a dozen homes were bombed In 1951, no one was held accountable.

Only one person was tried, but later acquitted.

It wasn't the first time black homes were bombed in Dallas, but it was the first time someone was tried for it.

- Since they actually do attempt to prosecute someone in the second bombing homes, it, it stops it.

Even though they never convicted the guy that they, they, they said did the bombing, or one of the guys who did the bombing.

- Despite the terror brought on by the bombings, the community within South Dallas pushed forward.

- Many of our movements in this city came from this part of town, south Dallas property.

- They don't tell the the full story.

There was a civil rights movement.

There were demonstrations.

- The conditions that exist throughout Dallas are conditions that stifle the growth of us, the black people of Dallas.

- The whole climate was shifting, and I think black power, the whole call from power, not just for equality in the sense of city besides someone to have accommodations, the same with really determining your, your life and your family's future.

- In a neighborhood next to Fair Park Life and wealth created by black families was at stake.

It became the focal point of activists around the country in an effort to increase profits.

The state fair of Texas hired a research firm in 1966 that reported intense emotional discomfort in middle class white residents of Dallas when passing the homes of black residents on their way to the fair.

All that was needed to eliminate the problem was to remove poor Negroes in their shacks.

The city started buying black residents homes for pennies on the dollar in an effort to erase them from view.

Through a process known as imminent domain, - Dallas had this reputation in the civil rights movement as being worse than Mississippi.

The the Dallas.

What the Civil Rights Movement thought about Dallas, that Dallas was the worst city in the South, the most racist city in the south, the evilest city in the south.

- Civil rights leader, Peter Johnson was on a short assignment in Dallas promoting a film about the late Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Little did he know his stay in Dallas will be extended after a knock on his hotel room door.

- It was a man named Lipton, a man named JB Jackson, a woman named Elsa Faye Higgins, and another man named Mr. Gideon Jacksons.

And they came into my hotel room and told me who they were.

And they lived in this area called Fair Park.

And the city was taking their homes, not their houses, not their land.

But the city has taken my home.

- If you're black, you're labeled as a troublemaker.

Now, if I was white and stood up for my rights, I'd be just an interested citizen, you know?

- But being this was a very intimidating city to the black community.

This city had walked over these people, all they knew was that whatever the white people in downtown Dallas wanted to do, that's what nobody had, never bucked them before and stood up to them - To Johnson.

The city's intimidation tactics fell short.

He went directly to the mayor, Eric Johnson, and spoke to him.

And city attorney Alex Bickley, - Alex Bickley and Eric Johnson explained this to me that we have our negro leaders, we choose our negro leaders here, we meet with the Negro leaders, then we tell the Negro leaders to go tell the Negro community what we want them to do.

That's the system they had here.

And what I explained to Alex Blin, Eric Johnson, that, so that's gonna change.

- After months of strategic lobbying, Peter Johnson persuaded the mayor to meet directly with the Fair Park homeowners.

They negotiated a better price for their land, though still woefully below its worth.

And under Johnson's guidance, they made one additional demand, one that would serve a powerful symbol to the entire city.

Sunny morning, - As thousands turn out to watch the Cotton Bowl parade, - The Cotton Bowl parade had to be desegregated.

- When I got up that morning and Didn turned the TV on the Cotton Bowl parade was going, and Sam Donald was announcing, and here's the them girls from East Texas that that marched.

And here comes the mayor in this brand new Cadillac convertible Cadillac.

And this is the mayor's car leading the parade.

Then Sam said, and I don't know who that negro man is sitting next to, the mayor, - The Fair Park homeowners indeed stood together and demanded to be heard.

But the financial costs of losing their houses and the equity they could have built impacted them for generations to come.

The homes they once owned were bulldozed, flattened into what remains a sprawling parking lot.

The event left a lasting imprint on the city, turning the group of helpless homeowners into fearless leaders.

Many would go on to serve as voices for their community in Dallas and beyond joining the ranks of civil rights leaders who laid the foundation of civic engagement in the city.