A near death experience influenced a DeKalb County man to spend his life fighting for racial equality. Lanier Phillips died recently just two days before his 89th birthday. Family and friends remembered his struggle and work at his funeral this weekend.
A trumpet player blowing the gospel song “Just a Closer Walk With Thee” leads a line of Phillips’ family and friends walking into Union Missionary Baptist Church in Lithonia. Phillips was born in Lithonia and was baptized in this church was he was 9 years old. Black children like Phillips also went to school in church because government schools were segregated at that time. Phillips went the Yellow River church school until the Ku Klux Klan torched the building. Ellis Ingram is Phillips’ cousin.
“When that school was burned down, his loving mother sent him to live with family in Chattanooga, Tennessee where he could further his education,” said Ingram.
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