Facing Down Storms" highlights Ida B. Wells’ courageous and inspiring actions as she challenged white supremacy in the late 19th century and early 20th century while navigating the complicated politics of race and gender of the time.

Today, the nation continues to struggle with issues of race, class and gender. This film shows how Wells navigated those times and inspires us to learn from her activism to address the same issues in our lifetime. We are very proud that this documentary is produced by Memphians about a legendary Memphian, and we are very excited to share Ida B Wells’ story with the world.

Facing Down Storms explores the early life and hardships of Ida B. Wells’ (1861-1932), that includes the death of her parents from Yellow Fever; racial and gender discrimination Wells’ experienced; and the lynching in 1892 of three African American men in 1892 - Thomas Moss, Will Stewart and Calvin McDowell - in Memphis, Tennessee. This lynching launched Wells’ international crusade for justice. Posthumously awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 2020 for her investigative journalism, Wells extensive reports and writings condemned whites for their racism and the atrocious practice of lynching of African Americans.

At the time of the lynching, Wells was the co-owner of the newspaper, the Free Speech and Headlight, then located on historic Beale Street in Memphis. Wells’ forceful condemnation of the lynchers in articles she wrote for the Free Speech and Headlight shook Memphis. Whites retaliated against Wells by destroying the office of the Free Speech and Headlight and by threatening to murder Wells. Wells, who was on a train to New York at the time of the destruction of her office, never returned to Memphis.

Prior to 1892, Wells began to find her public voice as a social critic through journalism. However, the lynching of Moss, Stewart and McDowell cemented Wells as a fearless advocate and activist, who traveled throughout Britain and the United States to publicize the brutality of lynching, and to gain allies in her fight against it.

As Wells investigated lynchings across the South, Wells used facts and statistics to prove that the lynchings bore no relationship to justice, but rather were intended to marginalize and suppress African Americans in American life. In Facing Down Storms, Paula Giddings, a professor at Smith College and an expert on Wells, points out that Wells realized that it was not enough for African Americans to be “upstanding” and to seek economic advancement. Rather, racism must be eradicated at its roots to allow African American to be free from violence and to fully live as citizens. Wells’ courage and insights have made her a heroine to the Black Lives Matter Movement and other activists today who are striving for racial equality.

The murder of George Floyd, and the death of Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Trayvon Martin and many others either at the hands of police, or vigilantes, demonstrates that African Americans still exist at the margins of American life. As in Wells’ time, the race issue continues to thrust the nation into moments of reckoning and reflection."