Tens of thousands of people from all walks of life paraded across a Selma, Alabama, bridge on Sunday to commemorate the 1965 "Bloody Sunday" march for U.S. civil rights, reports Reuters.

The original march, known as "Bloody Sunday," happened on March 7, 1965. It got its name from the roughly 600 peaceful civil rights activists who were attacked by white police with batons and tear gas.

This year's 50th anniversary march was peaceful and festive as celebrants carried signs, cheered and sang "We Shall Overcome" while walking across the Edmund Pettus Bridge.

"It's very crowded but at the same time it's fun and really great to see everybody coming together all races, all people," one woman told CNN as she and others began marching across the bridge.

Demonstrators who participated in the 1965 march were mixed with new participants, some of which called for gay and immigration rights.

U.S. Representative John Lewis, who led the march 50 years ago and was knocked unconscious by a state trooper, locked arms with Peggy Wallace Kennedy as they walked to the foot of the Edmund Pettus Bridge on Saturday where each spoke, along with President Barack Obama. Kennedy is the daughter of George Wallace, the governor of Alabama at the time of the 1965 march who ordered state troopers to attack demonstrators.

Kennedy spoke to the crowd about her father's past and her determination as an adult to make things right.

"I want to do something my father never did and recognize John Lewis for his humanity, his dignity and for being a child of God," she said. "And I want to stand here and say to him 'Welcome home.'"

Lewis told reporters he was very grateful.

"What she said was very moving -- it made me cry," he said.

In his speech about racial progress in America on Saturday, President Obama told the thousands of people who gathered, "Our march is not yet finished. But we are getting closer."

The march's anniversary arrives at a time of renewed focus on U.S. civil rights stemming from the recent deaths of black men at the hands of white police officers. Last year, Michael Brown, 18, of Ferguson, Missouri, and Eric Garner, 43, of Staten Island, New York, died during confrontations with police.

Tony T. Robinson Jr., 19, who was reportedly unarmed, was fatally shot by a Madison, Wisconsin, police officer on Friday.