Free at Last: The Civil Rights Movement and the People Who Made It

Uses the words and accounts of participants in the American civil rights movement to study the evolution of the movement, the personalities involved, and the role of the government, the FBI, and segregationists

Powledge's intimate knowledge of the civil rights movement, which he covered for the New York Times and the Atlanta Journal , shines through on every page of this massive chronicle. An essential sourcebook, it blends a perceptive narrative with the stirring oral testimonies of diverse participants. Prior to the movement, black Southerners lived in a police state, a place where violence could be visited upon them at any moment. Powledge traces the black rebellion that percolated for years before 1954, then he documents the massive resistance of whites, both Southern and Northern, to blacks' growing demands for equality. He blasts the Kennedy administration for its waffling and its willingness to tolerate racism in several areas, and he highlights crucial differences between movement strategies in the South and in the North, where "the opposition was hidden and diffuse." Those still struggling to break down discriminatory barriers will glean from this inspirational resource a sense of connectedness to history.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

America's civil rights movement had heroes beyond Martin Luther King, owed little to federal help, and was hardly a forward march to glory from Montgomery to Selma. These are themes of Powledge, whose narrative sketch of the 1950s and 1960s, years he saw as a newspaperman, loosely cements together more than 50 interviews. A surprising range of persons speak: Julian Bond, James Farmer, and lesser-known civil rights veterans; an FBI agent; Alabama Governor John Patterson; Albany, Georgia, Police Chief Laurie Pritchett, other segregationists. "Trying something and seeing what worked and what didn't work"--such was the nature of countless heroic acts across the South, which added up to the movement portrayed with great immediacy by Powledge. His book is as rich as Henry Hampton's Voices of Freedom ( LJ 2/15/90). Highly recommended for public and college libraries; of interest to scholars, too. Photos and index not seen.
- Robert F. Nardini, N. Chichester, N.H.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.