“Walk Against Fear: James Meredith,” scheduled to air Thursday on the Smithsonian Channel, examines the life of a U.S. Air Force veteran and human rights agitator whose admission to the University of Mississippi forced President John F. Kennedy to send federal troops into the state to quell a white supremacy uprising. It was one of the most violent moments of the Civil Rights Movement and Meredith’s determination to enroll in Ole Miss forever transformed life in the American Deep South.

Known as a bold, stubborn character from the movement, Meredith was later shot during a peaceful demonstration in Mississippi, and years later drew anger from civil rights leaders for endorsing former Klansman David Duke for Louisiana governor. He shunned interviews and openly supported former segregationists who he said he was helping transform.

But Meredith told The Associated Press on Tuesday he believed all of his actions in his life had been predestined by higher forces. “My life has always been according to a plan,” Meredith said. “And I was not the engineer of most the plan.”

Born in Kosciusko, Mississippi, Meredith graduated from high school in St. Petersburg, Florida, and enlisted in the U.S. Air Force, where he took courses at New Mexico Western College — now Western New Mexico University — in Silver City, New Mexico. Those classes in New Mexico changed his life and set him on a path to become a writer. “It was the most important thing that ever happened to me,” Meredith said.