As a child growing up in Ebenezer Baptist Church, Angela Farris was in awe every Sunday as she watched a parade of women walk into the sanctuary adorned in brightly colored and elaborate church hats.
None more so than her mother, Christine King Farris. She had more than 200 to choose from.
“Mom believed in the fashion of hats and she was very stylish,” Farris said. “Some hats were a whisper. Some were a shout. Some were cocked saying don’t speak to me. While others were asking, don’t you see me? But they all have a way of speaking and that’s what I saw growing up.”
When Christine King Farris, the oldest sister of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., died in 2023, her daughter made a point to collect and save all those hats. She already had about 25 hats that belonged to her grandmother, Alberta Williams King. About a half dozen from her aunt Naomi King and about 30 from her other aunt, Coretta Scott King.
Credit: BITA HONARVAR / AJC
Credit: BITA HONARVAR / AJC
The collection of hats once owned by those four women are now on display at the Atlanta History Center as the “Hats of the King Family Women” exhibit, part of the larger “She Shall Not Be Moved” tribute honoring the women of the Civil Rights Movement.
The History Center is collaborating with Angela Farris and the Christine King Farris Legacy Foundation for a yearlong exhibition of the hats. The initial 17 hats are on display now and another set will debut in July.
“We’re very mindful that all of these hats tell a story and these four women had phenomenal stories. They weren’t just adjacent to Dr. King. They were very important to him and he was important to them,” said La’Neice Littleton, the center’s director of community collaborations. “These women were not only important to their communities, but also symbols of beauty and class. We see that in all of these different iterations of the hats.”
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Adorned with bows, fur and pearls, with wide brims, small brims and no brims, the first set of hats encased under a glass case reflect the four women’s roles as matriarchs, advocates and symbols of faith and resilience.
“Hats are really an accessory that goes beyond the borders of just wearing them,” said fashion historian Courtney A. Hammonds. “They are also conversation pieces.”
Some are subtle like the “black net open pillbox hat with black velvet trim” worn by Alberta King.
Credit: contributed
Credit: contributed
Some are flashy, like the “royal blue satin ribbon in straw style, pillbox hat base with conical flare up brim and large bow,” that Christine King Farris wore at the dedication of her brother’s Washington, D.C., national memorial.
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Some are recognizable like the “black felt pillbox hat base with black feathers,” which Coretta Scott King famously wore in an iconic photograph with her husband.
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Some are studded with jewels and flowers, like the purple encrusted turban, sometimes worn by Naomi King, the wife of A.D. King.
Although she had been helping curate the exhibit for two years, Farris said the first time she say it on display at the Jan. 18 opening, she wept.
“My mother wore hats because her mother wore hats and because her mother’s mother wore hats,” said Farris, who has taught psychology at Spelman College for 30 years. “So it was a tradition true to the African American tradition of women wearing hats. But it also tells a story about what they did and what they’re known for. Collectively, it’s a powerful story.”
Credit: Jenni Girtman
Credit: Jenni Girtman
During the 18th century, laws restricting what enslaved and free Black people could wear were not uncommon and in many states, Black women were required to cover their heads as a form of subordination and inferiority. In Louisiana, their tignon laws demanded that women of color cover their hair with a knotted headdress and not adorn them with jewels when out in public.
Many women defied the law and decorated their headdresses until the ruling went out of favor after the 1803 Louisiana Purchase. Still, some enslaved and free women of African descent continued to wear headwraps as a symbol of resistance to white colonialism, Hammonds said
But by the early 20th century many working-class Black women worried less about fashion and more about eking out a meager living.
Except on Sundays, where for that one day a week, they could control how they wanted to look and present themselves to the world.
Hammonds — who also grew up in church watching the Sunday parade of fashion — said Black women wear hats to demonstrate not only social status, but creativity and individuality.
“When it comes to hats, it is a crown of glory. Women understood that it was an accessory of choice. The hat announced you before you announced yourself,” said Hammonds, whose father was a pastor in Columbus, Georgia. “They are symbols of both defiance and dignity.”
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Credit: arvin.temkar@ajc.com
Alberta Williams King, the mother of Christine King Farris and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. loved a good hat. She was the daughter of A.D. Williams, the second pastor of Ebenezer and the wife of Martin Luther King Sr., who succeed him. Several of her hats date back to the 1920s and it was expected of her to look good in church.
It was expected of Christine King Farris as well. While she attended church every Sunday, she especially shined during the years that she served as the official hostess of the annual MLK Commemorative Service.
In the ceremony that aired live across the country, she always looked resplendent in a hat that perfectly matched her dress and shoes.
Credit: AJC Staff
Credit: AJC Staff
“She looked good and people complimented her,” Angela Farris said. “And as the years went by, people would say. ‘we can’t wait to see you and see what hat you’re going to be wearing.’”
Littleton said all of the hats in the collection were in remarkable condition and aside from an occasional spot of makeup, none of them required restoration.
When Alberta Williams King died in 1974, Farris said many of her grandmother’s hats and clothes were given to family members.
When Coretta, Naomi and Christine died, their daughters inherited their hats. And their traditions.
Angela Farris said she has between 50 and 75 hats of her own that she wears most Sundays at Ebenezer. Angela Farris’ daughter, Farris Watkins, is keeping the family custom alive having collected about 10 hats of her own, which she wears to church. She is 28 years old.
Credit: Miguel Martinez
Credit: Miguel Martinez
For Farris’ part, she has never worn any of the 200 hats her mother left her.
“I’ve been sort of nervous about wearing my mom’s hats,” she said. “It’s kind of like wearing her shoes. They are too big to fill.”
IF YOU GO
The “Hats of the King Family Women” exhibit will run at the Atlanta History Center through the end of 2025 as part of the center’s “She Shall Not Be Moved” tribute honoring the women of the Civil Rights Movement. Atlanta History Center, 130 West Paces Ferry Road NW, is open Tuesday–Sunday from 9 a.m. until 4 p.m.
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