Mothers of Massive Resistance: White Women and the Politics of White Supremacy: A Review and Audio Book Giveaway

Congratulations to Connie Saunders who won Memphis, Martin, and the Mountaintop from last week's blog.

When I read the blurb about MOTHERS OF MASSIVE RESISTANCE: White Women and the Politics of White Supremacy (Oxford University Press, 2018) in the Tantor Audio catalogue, I thought it might provide a different perspective on the Jim Crow era. It definitely did.  

Dr. Elizabeth Gillespie McRae's work is a comprehensive, well-researched treatise on the role white women played in the politics of Southern segregation from the 1920's-1970's. McRae focuses on four women who influenced multitudes of others through their writing and political activism:

• North Carolina journalist, Nell Battle Lewis
• Mississippi newspaper editor Mary Dawson Caine
• South Carolina political activist Cornelia Dabney Tucker
• Mississippi columnist Florence Sillers Ogden. 

Since I am unable to summarize twelve hours of listening, I will share some facts that resonated with me. 

REVIEW

• In Bear Mountain, Virginia from the 40's - 90's light-skinned blacks (and possibly some native Americans) paid a lot of money to purchase "white" birth certificates. Changed birth certificates allowed children to attend the better, all-white schools. Monacan Native Americans were forced to identify as black. White bus drivers, teachers, and voter registrars were often the people who determined a person's race and generally upheld Jim Crow and the one-drop rule. See this article on Walter Plecker.
• Mildred Lewis Rutherford (1851-1928) was a pro-confederate daughter of a Georgia plantation owner who paved the way for pro-segregationists white women. As the historian general of the Daughters of the American Confederacy, she believed that whites were superior, state governments should dominate schools and social welfare and textbooks should be censored. McRae said she "single-handedly reinvented the South."
• Women's suffrage in the South gave a platform to support Jim Crow. McRae described Florence Ogden as a "subversive columnist." Besides being anti-integration she also supported anti-immigration legislation. 
• Cornelia Tucker's efforts in Charleston, SC led to the rise of Republicans in South Carolina and Eisenhower winning the vote in 1954. She was against European refugees and wanted blacks purged from the Republican party.
• Nell Lewis, the first female reporter for the Raleigh News and Observer, considered The Birth of a Nation the best film ever. At the same time that she wanted to end child labor, promote mental health reform, abolish capital punishment, she was also against labor unions since she believed they were pro-Communist. McRae writes that Lewis's stories upheld white supremacy as white women were the "guardians" of racial segregation. 
  
• White women were angry with Eleanor Roosevelt for eating with blacks in North Carolina.
• During WWII, segregationists feared white women working with black laborers. They wanted to protect workplaces for returning white soldiers.
• Cornelia Tucker linked Communism with civil rights. Her battlefield was school textbooks. 

  

  Montgomery, Al anti-school integration protest. 1961

https://blackpast.org/classroom/how-use-controversial-images-engage-students-history

• Many southern women defended segregation as what "God began and wanted." 
• They appealed to women's maternal duty to protect their children from mongrelization; there was a pervasive fear of miscegenation.

  

  Baltimore, 1954
  Image via AP

• Many white southern women feared progressive education that included curriculum which studied other nations.
• Members of the DAR condemned the United Nations. 
• After the Brown decision in 1954, black parents feared sending their children into white schools that were hostile to their children. They lived with fear, uncertainty, and hope. 
• In 1956, following the Brown vs. Board of Education decision, North Carolina "patriots" wrote to black families asking them to reconsider going to white schools.
• When Emmett Tillett was murdered, one of the women (I believe it was either Nelle Lewis or Florence Ogden) wrote, "There is no outcry. It must not have happened."
•  Calling upon their duty as mothers, segregationist women thought white schools would prevent interracial marriage and maintain white supremacy. They feared federal court decisions which would challenge their private lives. They blamed the Jews, communists, socialists, and NAACP for integration attempts. 
• In North Carolina alone, there were 28,000 people who signed petitions against the Brown vs. Board of Education decision.

  

  Little Rock, 1959

• In Little Rock, AK closing Central High in 1958 was the white women's victory to mobilize their children and preserve white schools. 
• In Virginia and North Carolina "school choice" was a way to avoid integration. 

  

  September 2, 1970, protest at Charlotte-Mecklenburg Public School headquarters. White students adopted the 'freedom of choice' language that segregationists had invoked since the Brown decision. While black youth in the NAACP watched as white students pledged support for integration but not for the busing that would accomplish it. Courtesy of the Charlotte Observer and the Robinson-Spangler Carolina Room, Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County.

• In the mid-1970's Boston mothers who were opposed to busing, looked to southern women for direction. The bus, not the children became central. Complex class politics, working class concerns, and maintaining property rights were central in protecting white privilege for these "true American women."

Anti-busing rally in South Boston
Spencer Grant Collection
Boston Public Library

Here is an audio snippet narrated by Kristen Potter. Ms. Potter does an excellent job articulating the book and using a southern, genteel voice as appropriate.

Click below for an interview with the author.

GIVEAWAY 

I am giving away my copy of this audio book. Please leave me a comment by November 15. Share it on social media or become a new follower of my blog and tell me what you have done, and I'll enter your name twice. 

Memphis, Martin, and the Mountaintop: A Review and Giveaway

Congratulations to Linda Phillips who won a copy of Back On Earth from last week's blog.

Alice Faye Duncan reached out to me through Twitter and asked if I was willing to review her two new picture books. Since I'm always interested in highlighting new books for you, of course I said yes! Here's the first one, MEMPHIS, MARTIN, AND THE MOUNTAINTOP: The Sanitation Strike of 1968, illustrated by R. Gregory Christie. (Boyds Mills Press, 2018)

This historical fiction picture book aimed at upper elementary or middle school readers, is based on the life of Memphis teacher, Dr. Almella Starks Umola. Her father was a pastor, community organizer, and strategist for the sanitation strike. Dr. Umola walked with her parents during the protests and heard Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. deliver his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech. 

Here's a great interview with Ms. Duncan that includes the many revisions that went into this story told from the fictional character, nine-year-old, Lorraine Jackson's POV. 

REVIEW

I remember Memphis. 

I remember the stinking sanitation strike. 

Alley cats, rats, and dogs rummaged through the trash.  

Black men marched through Memphis with protest signs raised high.  

I also marched in '68 with red ribbons in my hair.

That is the stark opening to Memphis, Martin, and the Mountaintop. Lorraine relates that the garbage trucks were old, rusty, and not well maintained. On a rainy, bleak day in Memphis, two black sanitation workers--working for $1.70 an hour--were crushed when a packer blade malfunctioned. 

"Slop dripped down their clothes."

Sanitation workers formed a labor union asking for better pay and safety on the job. Mayor Loeb refused their requests and one month later, the sanitation workers struck. 

In the morning and afternoon for sixty-five days, sanitation workers marched fourteen blocks through the streets of downtown Memphis...My daddy marched in that number. He marched for better pay. He marched for decent treatment. My daddy marched for me.

It was a difficult winter for young Lorraine, her parents, and the other strikers' families. But everyone was encouraged when they heard Martin Luther King, Jr. was coming to Memphis. 

"Dr. King said, 'All labor has dignity,'
Dr. King's voice was loud and stirring."

Dr. King organized a protest march and Lorraine, her mother, and other mothers and children went to the back of the line, while the sanitation workers marched in the front. Unfortunately, fifteen minutes into the march it was interrupted by rioters. The police responded quickly with tear gas and by beating innocent people. Her mother said, "Sometimes bad people mess things up for good people doing good."

That night, Mayor Loeb declared a state of emergency. "From my bedroom window, I saw soldiers in big green tanks creep slowly up the street. I waved to my friend Jan who sat in her window too."

"Nobody played outside that day. Fear locked us in our houses."

In April, Dr. King returned to Memphis but became sick and was unable to speak in person. His speech was broadcast to those who had gathered together at Mason Temple Church. "In the face of death threats, Dr. King spoke boldly. He encouraged Memphis strikers and strike supporters to march, boycott, and raise their voices for workers rights until victory was won."

That night, he was gunned down when a "bullet pierced the dreamer's neck." Afterwards, Lorraine Jackson wrote this poem and her mother hung it up on the crumbling walls of their rental home:

The King Is Dead

Not long ago,  

There lived a King. 

He did not live in a castle. 

He did not wear a crown. 

He did not rule a royal court 

Or ride in chariots.

The King marched in the streets. 

He lived to help the poor. 

He lived for peace and love. 

Hate killed the King.

The King is dead. 

What will the people do? 

The sanitation strike ended eight days later when President Lyndon B. Johnson sent in a labor official to negotiate a settlement. In the deal, the city recognized the labor union, the sanitation workers received 15 cents an hour more, and they were promised job promotions based on merit--not race.

"So much was won.
So much was lost.
Freedom is never free."

That hopeful yet sobering thought helps conclude this informative picture book. Ms. Duncan, as a librarian for the last 25 years in the Memphis public schools, included a timeline and annotated source list at the back of the book. I recommend this book as a curriculum resource for grades 4-7. There is a lot to learn within these pages and R. Gregory Christie's illustrations amplify the text.

Having recently listened to Eyes on the Prize, Memphis, Martin and the Mountaintop helped me visualize this particular event on the civil rights timeline.

GIVEAWAY

Ms. Duncan is giving away a personally autographed copy of this book to one fortunate winner. As she said in an email to me, "Readers deserve kindness and an extra 'oopmh'." Please leave me a comment by November 8 and your email address if you are new to my blog. If you share this post on social media and let me know what you did, I'll enter your name twice. 

Back on Earth: A Review and Giveaway

Congratulations to Bridgett Bell Langson who won, The Miscalculations of Lightning Girl.

"I wrote BACK ON EARTH: When Men First Landed on the Moon in anticipation of the fiftieth Apollo Eleven anniversary in 2019," North Carolina author Gretchen Griffith said. "I wanted today's young readers to understand how significant this event was to the children who witnessed it."

Illustrated by Bobbie Gumbert, this non-fiction picture book for elementary school students invites readers to participate in the experience. Here is the opening paragraph: 

Two of us landed on the moon July 20, 1969. Those of us back on earth stared into the sky. "Was the moon any different?" we wondered. 

Gretchen used the first person plural to emphasize that, "This story is much bigger than my personal reflections. It is a story about a world-wide corporate experience." In choosing that unique point of view, she aligns those watching the launch, the landing, and the recovery with the astronauts who made history plus implies that the reader is also part of the historic event. 

"Those of us at the launch site felt the ground tremble under our feet. We saw birds rousted from their nests."

In BACK ON EARTH there is a great juxtaposition of ordinary events along with what was going on in outer space:

While we waited [for the landing], we played space games. We designed helmets with tin foil and pretended we were astronauts. We pretended we could fly like birds. We strapped thermos jugs to our backs for make-believe air tanks...We mixed orange flavored powder in glasses of water and sipped the same tangy drink as the astronauts. 

After three long days of waiting, the Eagle landed!

"That's one small step for man,
One giant leap for mankind." Neil Armstrong

Gretchen included a list of YouTube titles, a glossary, and information on how to interview others who witnessed the moon landing with the hopes that "this will start the conversation between generations."

Just in case you want to watch (or re-watch) the landing, YouTube offers this:

GIVEAWAY: Leave me a comment by November 1 with your email address if you are new to my blog. Gretchen will send the winner a personally autographed book. US addresses only. 

The Miscalculations of Lightning Girl: A Review + a Giveaway!

Congratulations to Rosi Hollinbeck, my California blogger counterpart, who won the E-ARC of Lisa Kline's book, ONE WEEK OF YOU.

REVIEW

Authors are always encouraged to write an opening hook that will make the reader keep on reading. If this opening doesn't make you want to read more, I'm not sure what will:

I don't remember the moment that changed my life 4 years ago. Call it a side effect of being struck by lightning. That bolt of electricity burned a small hole in my memory. It also rewired my brain, transforming me into Lucille Fanny Callahan, math genius. (p. 1)

The Miscalculations of Lightning Girl (Random House, 2018) is by North Carolina writer Stacy McAnulty, a former mechanical engineer. Stacy's previous career explains why she can write a book that seamlessly weaves math into every page of the book.  

Lucy's newly acquired brilliant math skills is central to this middle grade novel that both boys and girls will enjoy. But the book is much more than that. Along with Lucy's new skills, she struggles with obsessive compulsive habits that make her feel different than others and leave her perfectly happy to be home schooled by her grandmother. But, Nana has other ideas. When her grandmother insists she attends East Hamlin Middle, Lucy thinks,

...Nana is forcing me to be part of this germ-infested community where people are called my peers only because we are the same age. My real peers [people she interacts with online] are creating algorithms and solving problems. They'll be changing the world while I'll be wasting time memorizing textbooks and ducking dodgeballs. p. 23

In school, she is cruelly teased for her OCD habits, but, "The dirt and germs bother me more than the nasty comments." (p. 38) 

In an effort to blend in and not be seen as a freak, she deliberately makes mistakes in math class. 

Nana wants 1 year, 1 friend, 1 book, and 1 activity. I calculate this will be easier to achieve without being a freaky genius. I can be normal smart. It's only middle school. This is about survival. (p. 55)

Lucy is grouped with Windy (the girl who knows everything about everybody) and Levi (a quiet photographer who "sees things in an instant that I must miss every day" (p. 113) for a service project. When the unlikely trio bond over their project at a pet adoption agency, for the first time, Lucy has friends who stick up for her. Working at the agency takes this plucky protagonist out of her comfort zone and proves to be a turning point for her. Suddenly, people (and dogs) start mattering to her more than getting the right answer to a math problem. 

In the end, 

Since starting at East Hamlin, I've climbed the 55 steps in the school 232 times and counted all 950 lockers. I've grown 3/4 of an inch and gained 6 pounds. I've had 77 math classes with 1 amazing teacher. I've read 2 books in language arts class (or 91,255 words). I've helped save 23 dogs so far and fallen in love with 1. I've even made 2 friends. I can add it all up, but the total doesn't begin to tell the story. As it turns out, I'm more than just numbers. (p. 283)

Teachers will like the comprehensive Educator's Guide; Educators and Counselors will appreciate the Empathy Guide that stimulates discussion on stereotypes and relating to someone who is different than oneself. 

GIVEAWAY

Random House is giving away a copy of LIGHTNING GIRL. Leave me a comment by October 25 for a chance to win. Make sure you leave me your email address if you are new to my blog. US addresses only. 

ONE WEEK OF YOU- by Lisa Kline's new YA novel and a Giveaway!

Congratulations to Jo Lynn Worden and Julian Daventry who won copies of DRIVE from last week's blog post. 

******

I am always honored when an author asks me to host their cover reveal. So, when Lisa Williams Kline asked if I was interested, of course I said yes! Her latest book, ONE WEEK OF YOU, (Blue Crow Publishing, February 2019) stars 15-year-old Lizzy who has to carry a flour baby for a week for her health class. During that time there are three prank fire drills and evacuations at school. In just one week, Lizzy realizes that adulthood brings complicated responsibilities. 

AUTHOR INTERVIEW

Lisa Williams Kline

Here Lisa shares some of the backstory of the book. 

CAROL: What prompted the story idea?

LISA: This story is fictionalized from two different real events. One year in high school my daughter had to carry a bag of flour for a week in her health class called a “flour baby.” I thought this was an interesting way to address human sexuality that had some comic potential. 

The second event took place several years later when there was a week in which there were three bomb threats in my other daughter’s high school. I was interested in the way the students handled that week. When I started writing this story, I thought, what if there were scary disruptions to the school schedule during the same week the kids had to carry the flour babies. I was partly interested in combining a somewhat comic story thread with one that wasn’t comic at all, and that has been one of the challenges in writing this story. It’s also a story of a first crush, and I based that on a combination of a couple of high school crushes of my own. And I have always been a forgetful person, and I incorporated that character flaw into my main character Lizzy. 

CAROL: Did you interview or research the book in anyway? If so, who did you talk to and how did you research it?

LISA: Yes, for example, part of my story involves student hacking of the school computer system, and I interviewed an IT expert on how the students could do this hacking. I also interviewed a teacher about school evacuations. I also had some teens read it and give me feedback about the voice. 

CAROL: I understand that you put aside the manuscript for awhile and then came back to it. Had the story changed in your mind in the interim? If so, how?

LISA: The story has evolved quite a bit over the time that I have been working on it. I put it away when I was working on the Sisters in All Seasons series. When I took it back out, I thought, hey, I think I can work on this again, there are some good moments here. Various editors and agents have all had suggestions for changes, and the story is quite a bit different than it was starting out. 

CAROL: What is the message you hope your readers will take away?

LISA: I wasn’t really thinking about a message when I wrote this book. I just wanted to tell a story that I hoped would be engaging. Many of my books end up being coming of age stories, and I think this one is too. I guess if there’s any message it would be to be kind to everyone. 

CAROL: Can you share some of your path to publication for ONE WEEK of YOU? 

LISA: While I’ve had an agent in the past, I do not have an agent now. I sent the manuscript directly to the editors at Blue Crow Publishing. www.bluecrowpublishing.com 

I queried Blue Crow Publishing and in a few weeks they asked for the manuscript. Lauren Faulkenberry wrote me about six weeks later, after she’d read it, with a revision request. In that revision, she wanted me to mostly ramp up the tension more and make a change to the ending. I worked on that revision for a little more than a month, sent it back, and after a few weeks she send me a publication offer. I was absolutely thrilled!

Lauren and Katie at Blue Crow have been wonderful to work with. After I signed the contract, Lauren wrote me an editorial letter in which she asked for more changes, such as fleshing out the setting more and describing the characters more fully. I also did another round of revisions for Katie. Blue Crow is an indie press, and the personal attention has been fantastic. I really feel as though Lauren and Katie were one hundred percent behind me and my book. So far it’s been a great experience. 

CAROL: Thanks for sharing all of that, Lisa. It's great to hear of an indie press that's working hard for its authors! And now for the moment you've all been waiting for (unless you cheated and scrolled down)--here is the lovely cover for Lisa's new book!

GIVEAWAY

Leave your name (and email address if I don't have it) to enter the giveaway of an eARC for ONE WEEK OF YOU. Enter soon! Giveaway ends October 18!

DRIVE: A Review and Two Giveaways!

Congratulations to Clara Gillow Clark and Dorothy Price who won the downloadable version of Eyes on the Prize from last week's blog.

The night that I stayed up late to finish reading Joyce Hostetter's fourth book in the Bakers Mountain Stories series, DRIVE (Calkins Creek, 2018), I texted Joyce: "This is going to be a hard book to review. There are too many wonderful things to say about it. Somehow you're able to catch the heart of emotions so well. I'm still crying."

The funny thing is that I almost didn't read the book. I'd read several drafts and thought that I knew the story. Boy, was I wrong!

After all the brainstorming, outlining, and drafting that I'd read, Joyce added layers of characterization, sensory details, and plot points that deepened the story. Having read those earlier drafts, I look back and see how she added flesh to the bones of her story--and I got to see a book develop and grow. 

One other interesting background note. When Joyce was brainstorming DRIVE, I had just given up writing Half-Truths from two points-of-view. I told Joyce of my struggles to make each character act and sound differently from the other. There's no mistake: Joyce pulls this feat off beautifully. This is a story of twin sisters vying to hold onto their sisterhood at a time when they're growing up and apart.

REVIEW 

PROLOGUE- Ellie

Mommy says Ida was born ten whole minutes ahead
   of me
and I spent the first years following after her,
doing what she did
and trying to be as good as she was.

Then, when Daddy came home from war
with hurts we couldn't see
and moods he couldn't predict,
the uncertainty hit Ida hardest of all.
She pulled back like a turtle inside its shell,
slowing down while I sped up.
I soon realized I liked running ahead,
hearing people cheer for me.

But sometimes, it was Ida they'd be bragging on,
And when they did,
I always felt that I was losing.
Life became a competition that one of us had to win.

And I was determined that the winner would be me. (p. 5)

********

Competition. This theme pervades the book as Ellie and Ida prepare to enter their first year of high school. As the reader meets the girls, we see how Ellie thinks she's not as good as Ida and aches for a normal family:

I wanted a father who didn't get frazzled over a bad dream or loud noises. And a mother who wasn't always aching over her husband. I didn't actually want another family; I just needed to not be embarrassed by the one I had. (p.28)

Ida, who describes herself as the quiet one, avoids the spotlight and feels as if Ellie has the drive to succeed but she doesn't. 

...I stared at the red velvet curtain on the stage and thought how I never got to pull it open and shut. It was the only job I ever wanted in any play we ever did. But thanks to being a twin, I almost always had to be out front, doing something cute with Ellie and feeling like a country bumpkin in the shadow of a movie star. (p.29)

I loved seeing the sisters from each other's POV. This is Ida talking about their different reactions to their father:

Ellie wasn't scared of Daddy the way I was. She was more like Ann Fay. Bold. Always acting like there was no mountain so tall she couldn't climb it. No race so fast she couldn't win it. And no daddy so mean she couldn't charm him. (p.42)

In this section, Ellie thinks about taking Latin in school.

Ida wouldn't want me to because then we wouldn't have all our classes together. But that also meant I wouldn't always be compared to her. I could have a class that was all my own. A hard one that she couldn't show me up in.  (P.59)

Ida feels lost and shy in their new school but Arnie, a fellow freshman, reaches out to her. Ellie who is used to being the strong twin, sees Ida with Arnie and suddenly realizes that Ida might not need her anymore. What's worse is that Ellie has a huge crush on Arnie. This conflict leads to more tension and misunderstanding between the sisters. 

Throughout the book the word drive is used in a number of ways. One of the plot threads is Ellie's passion for racing and the Hickory Motor Speedway. Whereas Ida can't stand the noise and grit of the races, Ellie thrives on the excitement and exhilaration of watching the cars zoom around the track. Unfortunately, this love for a thrilling adventure leads to a devastating accident. Without a spoiler, let me simply say that Ida is the only one who can bring Ellie out of the no-man's land of her near-death injury. 

Joyce interlaces history throughout this skillfully written story.  The 1952 presidential election, the threat of communism, and the Korean conflict are all important backdrops to the drama taking place in the little town of Hickory. 

But that's not what made me tear up. Forgiveness, love, character growth, individual accomplishments against high stakes--all of these made me root for both Ida and Ellie, as I'm sure you will too. Although written for the upper middle grade reader, adults will also resonate with the coming-of-age theme interwoven into DRIVE. 

As I told Joyce, I'm a lot like Ellie. I think many of us will see a little bit of ourselves in the two sisters. And isn't that what a great book is about?

*******

EPILOGUE- Ida

After Daddy came home from war
with wounds we couldn't see
and moods he couldn't predict,
I pulled back and let Ellie take the lead.

I didn't mind so much if she wanted to run on past
and steal the show from me.
I didn't need to be seen or heard the way she did.
Art was my voice.

But then in her race to be first
Ellie crashed
and I had to go around her--
to face scary unknowns
and accept good things that came my way.

I think we both learned
that life is not a race with one of us winning
and the other losing.
We can drive on our own separate tracks
without competing.
And when we do
We'll each come out a winner. (p. 342)

GIVEAWAY and AN AUDIOBOOK WISH

Since so many of Joyce's fans read my blog, Boyds Mills Press kindly agreed to give away TWO copies of DRIVE. Leave me a comment by October 11 with your email address if you are new to my blog. If you want additional chances to win, share this on social media or follow my blog and I'll add your name twice to the hat--but make sure you tell me what you did. 

And while I'm on the topic of Boyds Mills Press--who wants the Bakers Mountain Stories to be published in audio format? I think they'd be perfect! If you agree with me, please join me in tweeting @boydsmillspress. 

Eyes on the Prize - Audio Book review and Giveaway

Congratulations to Megan Hoyt and Becky Scharnhorst who won copies of Viviane Elbee's book, Teach Your Giraffe to Ski.

It's hard to review a book that covers the entire Civil Rights period in as much detail as Eyes On the Prize by Juan Williams does. The book, suitable for adults and young adults, is simultaneously comprehensive, academic, and personal. Williams wrote it as a companion to the first season of the NPR series with the same title. As noted below, several segments are now on YouTube. 

Even though I have read many books on the civil rights era, William's book showed how one event led to another--like dominoes falling in succession. I recommended it to one of my experts, Vermelle Ely, who enjoys audio books. When we had talked previously my questions were about Charlotte and Second Ward High. When I asked her about Little Rock she said, "Sure we knew about it. But back then, news didn’t travel so fast." Her remark was historically revealing.

Although I have chosen different portions of the book to highlight, it is very difficult to summarize any of these historical events. For more detail--please read the book!

PART I

https://youtu.be/Ts10IVzUDVw
1954-1956

Charles Hamilton Houston served as a mentor to a generation of black lawyers leading up to the Civil Rights period. He was instrumental in attacking the "separate but equal" rules that governed the Jim Crow South. He investigated educational discrimination by creating movies of the schools for black children. Although he started with elementary schools, his goal was to develop graduate programs that were nonexistent for blacks. Houston was instrumental in pulling together the cases (including the historic challenge in Clarendon County, SC as I blogged about here) to create the lawsuit that eventually led to the Brown vs. Board of Education decision in 1954. Interestingly, Williams said that Emmit Till's murder did more for civil rights than Brown vs. the Board of Education as it brought the plight of southern blacks to national attention. 

PART II

 https://youtu.be/4D5xwC6M_Gk
1957-1962

Since blacks frequently used buses for transportation to work, Williams noted that it was no accident that bus boycotts throughout the South became the stage of protest. "Indignity suffered alone was debilitating, but indignity shared was powerful."  Although blacks feared white reprisal for their boycotts (losing their jobs and physical violence) a growing sentiment was that the time had come to take a stand for freedom. 

During this time Martin Luther King, Jr. preached nonviolence. Segregationists put pressure on white commissioners not to give in to black boycotts. The boycotts received national attention and

bus segregation started to be challenged in courts. 

The behind the scenes politics in all the cities, but especially Little Rock, AK were fascinating.  Desegregation was a political football from the local level all the way up to President Eisenhower. The politicians, including Governor Faubus, were often more interested in grandstanding than fair play. 

It was also interesting to track the role of the NAACP Youth Council as young adults and college students became involved in the movement. Williams features Diane Nash, John Lewis, and Jim Lawson who were leaders in nonviolent protests at lunch counters throughout the South. President Kennedy was deeply influenced by the student protests and became an important advocate of civil rights. An interesting segment at the end of the book details where these individuals were in 1987 when the book was published.

PART V

https://youtu.be/aP2A6_2b6g8
1962-1964

In this section I heard the sad story of Medgar Evars, a WWII veteran and civil rights activist who was murdered in 1963 by a Klansman. "All we wanted was to be ordinary citizens. If the Japs and Germans didn’t kill us, it looked like white Mississippians would." He was rejected at the University of Mississippi law school and was very active in the NAACP. This invovlement could lead blacks to being called niggers, alligators, apes, coons, possums and was often equated with being a Communist. 

Similar to the political maneuverings in Little Rock, the behind-the-scenes events among the Mississippi delegation and Lyndon B. Johnson's negotiations at the 1964 Democratic convention were insightful and fascinating. 

I can't possibly summarize Freedom Summer in 1964 when blacks were trying to register to vote. Whites threatened economic reprisals even though at times the blacks were better educated than the whites registering them. It was a summer of violence when President Johnson was spending money on Vietnam while blacks were being killed. But black teenagers singing the Star Spangled Banner and the marches from Selma to Montgomery were a source of inspiration to many. 

Williams noted that the decade between 1954 and 1964 saw more social change and more court decisions than any other decade. The lives of blacks and whites were forever changed because of the Brown vs. Board of Education decision in 1954, the Civil Rights Act of 1960, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Television forced the print press to be more honest. The white perspective was no longer the only one heard.

Listen to this audio snippet of the book and see what a fine job actor Sean Crisden did. 

GIVEAWAY

Leave me a comment by October 4 with your email address if you are new to my blog. Tantor Audio will provide a code for the winner to download the book.

Teach Your Giraffe To Ski- A Review and Giveaway

Seriously, if you had a giraffe, wouldn't you want to teach her to ski?

That's the story that author, Viviane Elbee, brought to life in her lively, imaginative debut picture book, TEACH YOUR GIRAFFE TO SKI (Albert Whitman and Co, 2018). 

Why didn't I think of a clever idea like that? Maybe because unlike Viviane, I never was brave enough to bring my young children to a ski slope and my days of skiing ended in a close encounter with a tree many years ago...

But, back to Viviane's fun story of a young boy who learns to overcome his fears while, of course, teaching his giraffe to ski. Here is a glimpse of her text and the kid-friendly illustrations by Danni Gowdy. 

First things first:

Next, you remind your giraffe that she's got to start small.

Then you teach her important moves like doing a pizza, making french fries and S's, and the importance of good manners on the slopes.

Even if she gets tangled up, you stick with her.

But what do you do when your giraffe races away and you have to keep her safe? What if she heads towards the SCARY ski lift on the VERY BIG slope? 

You'll just have to buy the book and find out for yourself!

GIVEAWAY

Last spring I had the privilege of hosting Vivian on my blog with her cover reveal. I started a (long!) list of people who wanted to receive the ARC. Albert Whitman is also offering a hard copy of the book when it releases in November. So go ahead, leave me your name (and email address if you are new to my blog) and I'll pick two winners on Thursday, September 27!

Puritan Girl, Mohawk Girl-- An Audio Book Review and Giveaway

Congratulations to Nancy Frederick who won SHE STARTED IT ALL on last week's blog.

REVIEW

PURITAN GIRL, MOHAWK GIRL (Amulet Books, 2017) written by John Demos and narrated by Christina Moore, is based on the true story of Eunice Kanenstewnhawi Williams who was kidnapped (along with her family) by the Mohawks when she was seven and taken to Canada. The attack on Deerfield Village, where she lived with her Puritan minister father, John Williams, her mother Eunice, and siblings, was in 1704. This attack was part of a series of raids and conflicts between the English and French as part of Queen Anne's War. As Demos notes in the prologue, different Native Americans tribes allied with both countries. 

Like Sandra Warren whose book, SHE STARTED IT ALL, was reviewed last week, John Demos wrote this work of fiction after researching and writing a nonfiction account The Unredeemed Captive: A Family Story from Early America which was published in 1995. 

I presume that the author used John Williams book, The Redeemed Captive, his account of being kidnapped and returned to Massachusetts. (The hard copy of PURITAN GIRL, MOHAWK GIRL includes substantial author's notes on the historical documentation along with details filled in by the author's knowledge of French Canadian, Puritan, and Mohawk customs and beliefs. Unfortunately these were not a part of the audio recording.)

The story graphically depicts Eunice's capture, the death of her mother and younger sister, and her abduction by the Mohawks. She is adopted by a woman who has lost her daughter. One year later, John Williams travels to try and get her back but is rebuffed by the chief who says that she belongs to them now. He leaves with the image of Eunice begging him to take her back home. 

Eunice receives a Mohawk name (Waongote), learns the language, and the history of the tribe. Two years later when a trader comes to the village and tries to convince her to come home, she has no desire to leave her Mohawk family and has totally forgotten the English language. When her father hears of this, it is a source of great grief and sorrow and he never truly gives up hope that she will return. 

When she is a teen of marriageable age, she receives the name Kanenstewnhawi and marries a Mohawk man who has already converted to Catholicism. The priests didn’t want to marry them in the church knowing how her father and the English will be upset that she was married as a Catholic Mohawk. They also didn’t want them to live in sin, so they're faced with a political and spiritual dilemma. The couple ends up getting married in a very small ceremony in the church. The priests want to keep it secret, but news gets back to her father through traders. Reverand Williams was shocked. How could she become Catholic and marry a savage?

As an adult, memories finally return to her of her former life and the raid; she blames her father for her mother's death. Long after her father dies, she returns to Massachusetts to see her brothers. Despite her family's prayers and petitions, she remains a Mohawk until her death. She is interested in receiving her share of her father's estate but is unable to receive it as a Mohawk. 

John Demos certainly dug deep to write this story, but the book reads more like an historical narrative than a work of fiction. The reader will gain a lot of information about the French Mohawks as well as the conflict between the Puritans and Catholics during colonial times, but the narrator tells the story, rather than Eunice herself. This distant storytelling technique make the novel less immersive. Other book reviewers mention this problem likening it more to a biography than a work of historical fiction.

Although I can't dispute Mr. Demos's research, it feels like a bit of a stretch that Eunice is so immersed in the Mohawk culture that she totally forgets who she is. She is Caucasian with light hair and obviously looked very different than the people around her. Wouldn’t she have questioned that?  

These concerns aside, I still think PURITAN GIRL, MOHAWK GIRL would be an interesting curriculum resource that will spark considerable classroom discussion.

Here is a snippet from the book, courtesy of Recorded Books. 

GIVEAWAY

If you are interested in entering this giveaway, please leave me a comment along with your email address if you are new to this blog. I will be giving it away in mid-October in conjunction with the fall issue of TALKING STORY on Colonial America.