(David Campbell / Alabama State University)

On Thursday, April 24, the Alabama State Bar unveiled a new statue honoring Fred Gray, a trailblazing civil rights attorney who won several landmark cases during the Civil Rights Movement.

The new statue now sits outside the Alabama State Bar Association in Montgomery.

New statue honors civil rights attorney Fred Gray

Born in Montgomery, Alabama in 1930, Fred Gray has amassed a large number of accomplishments during his 94 years on Earth. A civil rights activist, attorney, preacher and former member of the Alabama House of Representatives, Fred Gray won dozens of landmark cases during the Civil Rights Movement and represented dozens of high-profile civil rights clients during his 70-year career, including:

Martin Luther King, Jr.
Rosa Parks
Claudette Colvin
Vivian Malone and James Hood
Congressman John Lewis

Gray’s work during the Civil Rights Movement was only the beginning of his storied career. In 1970, Gray and Thomas Reed became the first African Americans elected to the Alabama State Legislature since the Reconstruction Era; around the same time, he represented plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit about the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment.

In 2001, Gray was elected as the first African American President of the Alabama State Bar; in 2022, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom—the nation’s highest honor for a civilian—by President Joe Biden.

Sculpted by California-based artist Steven Whyte, the new life-sized statue is located outside the Alabama State Bar in downtown Montgomery and honors Gray’s contributions and victories as a lawyer in Alabama.

Follow @thebamabuzz on Instagram and Facebook and sign up for our FREE newsletter to stay up to date on this and other exciting news in Alabama.