Founded in 1934 in Montgomery, Alabama, by Catholic priest Father Harold Purcell, the City of St. Jude included a church, hospital and high school with a mission to provide spiritual, health, education and social services regardless of race. In the early 1950s during a time of widespread segregation in the South, the hospital was the first in the region to integrate. In the evening of March 24, 1965 the City of St. Jude welcome marchers of the Selma to Montgomery March as the last stop and last of the four Campsites of the march. The next day, marchers led by Dr. Martin Luther King, departed the grounds of St. Jude and marched to the Alabama State Capital Building. A short 5 months later in August 1965, President Lyndon Johnson signed into law the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
