Fredie Carmichael

Editor’s Note: Fredie Carmichael, editor of the Meridian, Miss., Star, will be in Washington, D.C., to cover the inauguration of Barack Obama as the country's first black president for the CNHI News Service. Check this Web site for his blog, stories, photos and videos. Here is a pre-inauguration story about the importance of Obama’s presidency to the civil rights movement of the 1960s.

By Fredie Carmichael
CNHI News Service

Small towns are often known by the celebrities, athletes and the war heroes they produce -- their names emblazoned on streets, buildings and parks; tales of their success fodder for coffee shop conversations.

But occasionally small towns are remembered for ordinary people who demonstrate great courage in the face of an unpopular cause.

Jennifer Dupras, Education Coordinator at the MSPCA in Methuen, Mass., holds up Lefty, an eight-week-old Boston Terrier that underwent surgery at Angell Animal Medical Center in Boston for a ruptured eye. Photo credit: Roger Darrigrand/The Eagle-Tribune