Vashti Cromwell McCollum was an
American mother who fought and won a landmark decision in the US Supreme
Court against the teaching of religion in schools in 1948. Born in New
York in 1912, she lived with her husband and three sons in Champaign
Illinois. Their comfortable life was changed by her objection to
religious pressure and unpleasantness experienced by her eldest son in
his local public school.
She became associated with the Freedom
from Religion Foundation and American Humanist Association for whom she
served 2 terms as President. She wrote of her experiences in One
Woman's Fight in 1951 during her long campaign she and her family
suffered abuse and harassment at the hands of vandals. Exerpts from the
chapter Christian Halloween are reprinted in Women
Without Superstition "No Gods, No Masters" edited by Annie
Laurie Gaylor. She starts:-
'The phone calls were bad enough, and so
were some of the letters, but the biggest attack on us came in person on
Halloween......Nightly we were serenaded by the teen-age crown singing,
"Onward Christian Soldiers"....The next day was a bad one
right from the beginning......" it was reported in the local paper
as "McCollum Home Target" and by a local minister as
"Christian Halloween".