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Biography · Civil Rights

Fannie Lee Chaney

1921–2007

United States

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Biography

Fannie Lee Chaney (née Roberts; September 4, 1921 – May 22, 2007) was an American baker turned civil rights activist after her son James Chaney was murdered by the Ku Klux Klan during the 1964 Freedom Summer rides in Mississippi. After her son's murder, Chaney sued five restaurants in Meridian for racial discrimination. She was fired from her job and could not find other work. Crosses were burned on her lawn, and a firebomb intended for her family's house destroyed that of a neighbor.

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Biography text · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source checked 2026-10-13

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