Create a short biography paragraph that gives your readers background information about Fannie Lou Hamer and the experiences that shaped her role as an influential civil rights activist.
Fannie Lou Hamer was born in 1917 in rural Mississippi, where she lived and worked as a sharecropper for most of her life. Her early experiences included extreme poverty, racism, and violence, including a forced sterilization procedure. In the early 1960s, she became involved in the civil rights movement, joining the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and participating in voter registration drives. Hamer became a powerful and influential voice in the movement, delivering passionate speeches about her experiences and advocating for the voting rights of African Americans. Despite facing harassment, intimidation, and even violent attacks, she continued to fight for justice until her death in 1977. Today, she is remembered as a courageous and inspirational figure in the struggle for civil rights.
