Senator Eliot Shapleigh - El Paso, Texas

JENA, LA. — Venada Altheme spent 21 hours on a bus from Miami because she wanted to make a stand.

"We want to let the world know this is not a black and white thing," the 41-year-old said. "It's about injustice, and we need to correct that."

Harvey Barnett, a 49-year-old postal worker, traveled from Charlotte, N.C., because he'd expect other blacks to do the same if it were his child being persecuted.

"It could have been my kid," he said. "That's simple enough."

Altheme and Barnett were among thousands of protesters who overwhelmed this tiny town on Thursday, shouting into bullhorns, pounding drums and listening to speeches from the nation's most prominent black leaders as they denounced the prosecution of six black teens, five of whom were initially charged with attempted murder in the beating of a white classmate.

As the sun rose, marchers poured into the town of 3,000 chanting "Free the Jena Six," "No justice, no peace" and "Enough is enough," easily multiplying Jena's population several times over. Groups had traveled through the night from Houston, Atlanta, Detroit, Chicago, Dallas, St. Louis and smaller towns in between.

Though some feared the march could turn violent, law officers reported no major trouble from the protesters, whose numbers they estimated at 15,000 to 20,000. Event organizers put the attendance closer to 60,000, largely summoned by a campaign through black radio, Web sites, blogs and newspapers.

Thousands walked past the home of Dave Nelson, 70, a retired Jena High School English teacher who took photos and stopped to chat with marchers. A disc jockey blared music from a gravel lot next door.

"There's never been anything like this ever here in Jena. No one knew we existed until today," the white Jena native said. "I just hoped no violence, no destruction, no hurt. That's all I want, and nothing has happened so far."

Nearby, Brooklyn, N.Y., Christian music artist DJ Radikal, whose real name is Yohantz Mitchell, yelled: "Take a stand for justice!" 

From prank to prosecution

The first defendant to stand trial, Mychal Bell, 17, was convicted by an all-white jury of a lesser felony assault charge. The Louisiana Supreme Court, however, overturned that conviction, and Bell remains in jail in lieu of $90,000 bail.

A Houston caravan to the march included students from Texas Southern and Prairie View A&M universities as well as U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, a House Judiciary Committee member who wants LaSalle Parish District Attorney Reed Walters to explain his prosecutorial decisions in a congressional hearing.

"How do you incarcerate a young man for 10 months of his life for a schoolyard fight? That sure seems to be unfair," Jackson Lee said.

Walters has said the beating was unrelated to the nooses but that the media combined the two to create a storyline. 

'People get along fine'

Bo Smith, 46, toiled inconspicuously in his machine shop. "We decided to work today if we could get here," he said.

Smith, a white Jena native, said the march and resulting media coverage wrongly painted Jena as racist.

"The misinformation gives people the wrong idea," he said. "It's really very peaceful, and people get along fine."

Besides the media and documentary filmmakers, the day was memorialized with camera phones and home videos. People sold Jena Six T-shirts and food. As temperatures reached 90 degrees, the Red Cross handed out bottled water.

Those among the sea of people said the event marked a renewed activism reminiscent of the civil rights era.

Patrice Williams and Dwayne Morrow were headed from Houston to New Orleans for Saturday's TSU-Southern University football game but detoured to Jena.

"This is such a monumental event," said Williams, 25, a graduate student at the University of Texas School of Public Health. "We wanted to take the opportunity to take a stand and be a part of history."