Martha Bergmark

[5][6] In the late 1980s, she served as the civil division director and then as senior vice president for programs of the Washington DC–based National Legal Aid and Defender Association.

Bergmark grew up in a traditional middle class community in Jackson where racial segregation between blacks and white residents was common and enforced through Jim Crow era laws.

[2] By the time she was in high school, her parents and she were involved at the local level with the civil rights movement and new federal social service programs to help promote economic advances for African Americans.

Bergmark's decision to volunteer as an orientation counselor for incoming black students revealed for the first time to her friends and teachers her affinity to African Americans.

The low budget independent comedy about race, class and basketball in 1990s was produced out of Bergmark's family house on Montgomery Avenue in Takoma Park, Maryland.

[5][14][6] In 1978, when federal funds were enlarged by United States President Jimmy Carter's administration, she left the law practice to found the Southeast Mississippi Legal Services in a nine county area.

[6] In 1987, Bergmark relocated to Washington DC where she was civil division director and then as senior vice president for programs of the National Legal Aid and Defender Association.

[7] Bergmark was recognized as a "Champion of Change" by United States President Obama's White House in 2011 for her work to advance racial and economic justice.