McMillan Remembered as a Lifelong Fighter Against Racism and White Supremacy in Texas and Across the South
We recently lost a Texas civil rights soldier. Ernest McMillan recently passed away in Dallas. McMillan served as the Chairman of the Dallas SNCC from 1967- 1969. I knew Ernest McMillan, he was a soldier in the war against white supremacy.
Civil Rights history, where it pertains to African American fighters for freedom, is often told without a personal loving touch. There is no doubt that many were jailed, shot, brutalized, lynched, and suffered, but if one wants to wield a rich understanding of the historical freedom fighters one must examine the totality of their lives.
Members of SNCC, the Black Panthers, and others had a real life filled with victimization, hope, and courage.
“Standing” and Telling the Full Story
McMillan wrote a book he named Standing, a book which moves beyond the one-dimensional aspects of those that endured hardships early in life, but then found multi-dimensional redemption in the freedom struggle.
There was nothing rational about the institution white supremacy in America. Hidden heroic figures that fought against this hellish system have been ignored or maligned in the historical record while racist authorities are trying to prevent the telling of Black history.
His book is a historical revelation that moves from childhood to awareness and struggle, and is an important signpost in this new age of resistance.
Mr. McMillan was a warrior on the front line in the war against racism and we thank him for his service. He wonderfully told us about his journey across several southern states that were seething with racism, and the courageous struggle he marshaled, standing true to his heart and to our struggle for freedom.
Growing Up in Segregated Dallas
His book serves up a realistic chronicle of a Black boy growing up in highly segregated Dallas, Texas. Dallas was perhaps one of the most racist cities in the United States during Jim Crow segregation.
Ernest McMillan came of age within a loving family and a nurturing community. Dallas, like San Antonio, was often depicted as a place in which there was little racism. Such claims are totally false, as both cities had Jim Crow laws and entrenched white power structures. McMillan came of age fighting against white supremacy in the South.
He returned to his hometown Dallas to challenge the white power structure. As in all southern cities, and some northern ones as well, the authorities wanted to remove him by death or imprisonment.
They finally jailed him but never gave up.
Ernest McMillan wrote,
I traveled from my home (Dallas, Texas) in the summer of 1963 to stay with my father who was a Pastor of a Church in Newnan, Georgia…. I, and the SNCC co-leader were arrested, charged with ‘destruction of private property’ at one particular OK store, sentenced to ten years each.
These charges, though false, led to McMillan serving prison time of three years. However, upon release he went to work for the late State Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson.
Community Work and Political Engagement
McMillan founded the Fifth Ward Enrichment program in Houston in 1884 to help young boys become productive. McMillan was a veteran in the war against white supremacy, a war that is still ongoing.
He worked in Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia with SNCC and throughout the 80s with the National Black United Front. Earnest McMillan died March 27, 2026 the same day that Fahim Minkah (Fred Bell) Park was officially dedicated in honor of his friend, Fred Bell who chaired the Black Panther Party in Dallas.
Fred Bell (Fahim) trademarked the Black Panther name in Texas to keep some from stealing the name.
