Ever Is a Long Time: A Journey Into Mississippi's Dark Past, A Memoir - Softcover

Eubanks, W. Ralph

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0465021050 ISBN 13: 9780465021055

Publisher: Basic Books, 2005

Synopsis

In June of 1957, Governor James Coleman stepped before the cameras of "Meet the Press" and was asked whether the public schools would ever be integrated. "Well, ever is a long time," he replied, "[but] I would say that a baby born in Mississippi today will never live long enough to see an integrated school." In this extraordinary pilgrimage, Library of Congress Publishing Director W. Ralph Eubanks recaptures the feel of growing up during this tumultuous era, deep in rural Mississippi. Vividly re-creating a time and place where even small steps across the Jim Crow line became a matter of life and death, he offers eloquent testimony to a family's grace against all odds. Inspired by the 1998 declassification of files kept by the State Sovereignty Commission-an agency specifically created to maintain white supremacy-the result is a journey of discovery that leads Eubanks not only to surprising conclusions about his own family, but also to harrowing encounters with those involved in some of the era's darkest activities.

About this title

About the Author:

W. Ralph Eubanks is a native of Mount Olive, Mississippi. He lives with his family in Washington, D.C., where he is the Director of Publishing at the Library of Congress.

From Publishers Weekly:

Eubanks, the Library of Congress's publishing director, opens this capable memoir with an innocent question from one of his sons: "Daddy, what's Mississippi like?" In earnest prose, the author tries to describe "the world that shaped him" with its rigidly defined social code of race and class, using an almost coolly detached approach similar to the low-key demeanor of his father, a former county agent who earned much less than his white peers. While Eubanks applauds the changes that have occurred since Jim Crow laws ruled, he recalls with dread a terrifying incident when his "mixed marriage" drew hateful stares. He's almost sentimental when remembering his shielded childhood on the family farm outside the town of Mount Olive, where segregation's strict social laws were enforced. Eubanks's pleasant, unchallenging narrative can grind, as it drones on about his childhood home, "an idyllic place where racism and intolerance had no place." But that placid tone dissipates when he speaks forcefully of racial murders, the killing of civil rights leader Medgar Evers and the state's white citizens' deep hatred of Northerners. The book's unnerving sections come in Eubanks's revelations about the ultra-secret Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission, which kept files on its black citizens-including Eubanks's parents-during the civil rights era. As the book ends, it seems Eubanks is content to tie off his occasionally uneven mix of restrained horror and romanticized yearning with a neat bow, reconciling both past and present and leaving the perfect opening for a well-positioned sequel. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Basic Books
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 0465021050
• ISBN 13: 9780465021055
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 263