Pam Gaskin, 79, remembers a time in Galveston County when her father would be required to pay poll taxes in the '60s so he could vote, a payment that wasn't demanded of many white men in the South.

She witnessed the power of a united Black community at the polls, setting state history for representation and, more recently, the damage that can come when they don't.

But this year, she said she is witnessing what she's hoped for for years: a younger generation ready to take the reins.