A group of Cambridge residents began holding up “Black Lives Matters” signs at a busy intersection in The Port neighborhood every Friday after a white police officer killed George Floyd. Five years later, five of them are still there every Friday.
The protest began when a call for a Black Lives Matter demonstration was sent out on a neighborhood email group, rallying people to gather at Prospect and Broadway.
“Initially there were probably four or five people on each of these four corners, and we kept coming out Friday afternoons,” said Alan Meyers, 75, a retired pediatrician. “The group got whittled down so that now there’s just five of us. We’ve become this little unit.”
A video of Floyd’s death on May 25, 2020, sparked national outrage and led to nationwide Black Lives Matter protests calling for justice and police reform. The footage showed Derek Chauvin, a white officer who suspected Floyd of passing a counterfeit bill, kneeling on the African American man’s neck, causing cardiac arrest. Chauvin was convicted of murder and sentenced to 21 years in prison.
The Cambridge residents meet at Prospect and Broadway for 30 minutes on Friday afternoons, holding “Black Lives Matter” signs. They wave and smile at passersby, ready to engage in conversation with anyone who approaches.
“The problem is that, for some people, Black lives don’t matter,” said lifelong activist Tom Johnson, 69, a history professor at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. “It’s important to keep this in people’s minds, not so that they don’t think it was just a fad or a passing phase of 2020.”
Prepared to participate
Johnson’s passion for activism began at an early age. He recalls attending his first rally at 6 years old, advocating for desegregation after four Black college students started a sit-in when they were denied service at a Woolworth’s lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, in 1960. His mother was involved with the NAACP, and his father served as a draft counselor during the Vietnam War. His family maintained a close relationship with Albert Bigelow, one of the original Freedom Riders, activists who fought for desegregation. He said these experiences shaped his lifelong commitment to social justice.
Susan Bruce, 68, joined the group early on at the invitation of another protester.
“I went to the protests in Cambridge in relation to George Floyd being murdered, and I thought, ‘I don’t want it to be like I did a protest and that’s it. Now it’s over. What do I keep doing in relation to this problem that our country has?’” said Bruce, who spent her career in public policy and social science research.
Support and opposition
Drivers passing by honked and offered kind words on a recent Friday. A police officer handed them water bottles, and one woman gave them tea bags. Meyers uses a counter to track honks each week and remembers days when the group got more than 50.
“A couple of weeks ago a guy was stopped at the light he stepped out [of his car] and stopped to yell that he loves us,” Meyers said.
A retired couple – who would not speak on the record, saying they feared for their safety – joined the weekly demonstrations in the summer of 2020, became regulars and have kept showing up, even as the crowd thinned. Now, they stand on the corner, holding signs saying, “Protect and support a multiracial democracy.”
The group has encountered people who oppose their message, some arguing that “All lives matter” and others questioning why a group of white people is advocating for the Black Lives Matter cause.
“One person said, ‘How come you’re all white?’ And I said, ‘Well, that’s mostly who’s in this neighborhood,’” Meyers said. “Black people don’t need to hear this. They already know it all from their life experience. White people need to tell other white people.”
“Power in consistency”
Beena Sarwar, a Pakistani journalist and activist, said she was deeply moved to see a group of older white people advocating for a cause that extends beyond their own community. While she’s not a member of the group, she said she supports their efforts.
“In this day and age of social media, where everything is about standing on a soapbox and making yourself visible, people are all about promoting themselves,” Sarwar said. “They’re not doing that at all.”
Sarwar, who began her activism in Pakistan, has been an advocate for human rights and peace. From resisting the injustices of martial law under Pakistan’s military dictatorship in the 1980s to advocating for cross-border peace initiatives, she has witnessed the impact of supporting a cause.
“There’s power in consistency, integrity and constantly speaking out – in solidarity that transcends borders, boundaries, race and class,” she said.
A group of residents has gathered in the early mornings at daily Somerville High School to hold daily standouts in support of Palestine – the longest-running pro-Palestine protest at a high school in the country. They began in February 2024, paused at the end of the 2023-2024 school year and began again when the 2024-2025 school year started.
Driving change, and waiting for it
While one person or group can’t change the entire system, Sarwar said, they can be an effective part of a movement that drives change. Her father, the late Dr. Mohammed Sarwar, played a key role in founding the Democratic Students Federation, Pakistan’s first student union. The DSF fought for better education, democratic rights and social justice in 1950s Pakistan, inspiring activism.
A commitment to being a voice for change in their neighborhood has kept this group returning to this corner week after week, year after year.
“We’ll be here next week unless there’s no more injustice in the world,” Johnson said.
This story is part of a partnership between Cambridge Day and the Boston University Department of Journalism.
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