At a time when public advocacy against segregation and prejudice could mean lynching and shooting, Harry T. Moore emerged as a leading figure in Florida. As state NAACP executive secretary, he founded the Brevard NAACP Branch, organized more than 77 new branches, and conducted voter registration drives that produced 75,000 new Black voters in 1951. He also crusaded for and won equal pay for Black public school teachers. Declaring that “Every advancement comes by way of sacrifices,” Moore and his wife Harriett were killed in their home in Mims, Florida, by an assassin's bomb. He received the Arthur B. Spingarn Medal, the NAACP's highest honor, posthumously in 1952 for his invaluable contributions and courage in working for the full implementation of the democratic ideal.