Ed King Interview

Discusses the role of whites in the civil rights movement, relating the reasons for his own reluctant entry but later his deep involvement. Discusses the 1963 Freedom Vote project--a mock statewide election staged with the help of northern white college students--which ran Aaron Henry of the Mississippi chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) for governor and himself for lieutenant governor. Comments on the role and strategies of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party and its formal challenge to the state Democratic regulars during the 1968 national convention; race relations in Mississippi during the 1960s; the heightening conflicts between police and civil rights activists; the growing mood of Black militancy; Medger Evers' activities on college campuses; and the Freedom Summer of 1964. No tape available. Interviewer: James M. Mosby, Jr.

Ed King's Mississippi: Behind the Scenes of Freedom Summer features more than forty unpublished black-and-white photographs and substantial writings by the prominent civil rights activist Reverend Ed King. The images and text provide a unique perspective on Mississippi during the summer of 1964. Taken in Jackson, Greenwood, and Philadelphia, the photographs showcase informal images of Martin Luther King Jr., Andrew Young, Mississippi civil rights workers, and college student volunteers in the movement. Ed King's writings offer background and insights on the motivations and work of Freedom Summer volunteers, on the racial climate of Mississippi during the late 1950s and 1960s, and the grassroots effort by black Mississippians to enter the political arena and exercise their fundamental civil rights. Ed King, a native of Vicksburg and a Methodist minister, was a founder of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party and a key figure in the civil rights movement in the state in the 1960s. As one of the few white Mississippians with a leadership position in the movement, his words and photographs offer a rare behind-the-scenes chronicle of events in the state during Freedom Summer. Ed King is a retired faculty member of the School of Health Related Professions, University of Mississippi Medical Center. Historian Trent Watts furnishes a substantial introduction to the volume and offers background on the Freedom Summer campaign as well as a description of Ed King's civil rights activism from the late 1950s to the present day.

“The Fortunate Ones feels like a fresh and remarkably sure-footed take on The Great Gatsby, examining the complex costs of attempting to transcend or exchange your given class for a more gilded one. Tarkington’s understanding of the human heart and mind is deep, wise, and uncommonly empathetic. As a novelist, he is the real deal. I can’t wait to see this story reach a wide audience, and to see what he does next.” —Paula McLain, author of The Paris Wife When Charlie Boykin was young, he thought his life with his single mother on the working-class side of Nashville was perfectly fine. But when his mother arranges for him to be admitted as a scholarship student to an elite private school, he is suddenly introduced to what the world can feel like to someone cushioned by money. That world, he discovers, is an almost irresistible place where one can bend—and break—rules and still end up untarnished. As he gets drawn into a friendship with a charismatic upperclassman, Archer Creigh, and an affluent family that treats him like an adopted son, Charlie quickly adapts to life in the upper echelons of Nashville society. Under their charming and alcohol-soaked spell, how can he not relax and enjoy it all—the lack of anxiety over money, the easy summers spent poolside at perfectly appointed mansions, the lavish parties, the freedom to make mistakes knowing that everything can be glossed over or fixed? But over time, Charlie is increasingly pulled into covering for Archer’s constant deceits and his casual bigotry. At what point will the attraction of wealth and prestige wear off enough for Charlie to take a stand—and will he? The Fortunate Ones is an immersive, elegantly written story that conveys both the seductiveness of this world and the corruption of the people who see their ascent to the top as their birthright.

During the summer of 1964, hundreds of American college students descended on Mississippi to help the state's African American citizens register to vote. Student organizers, volunteers, and community members canvassed black neighborhoods to organize the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP), a group that sought to give a voice to black Mississippians and demonstrate their will to vote in the face of terror and intimidation. In For a Voice and the Vote, author Lisa Anderson Todd gives a fascinating insider's account of her experience volunteering in Greenville, Mississippi, during Freedom Summer, when she participated in organizing the MFDP. Innovative and integrated, the party provided political education, ran candidates for office, and offered participation in local and statewide meetings for blacks who were denied the vote. For Todd, it was an exciting, dangerous, and life-changing experience. Offering the first full account of the group's five days in Atlantic City, the book draws on primary sources, oral histories, and the author's personal interviews of individuals who were supporters of the MFDP in 1964.

In early 1963, twenty-eight white Methodist ministers caused a firestorm of controversy by publishing a statement of support for race relations change. Born of Conviction explores the statement's resulting influences on their lives, their reasons for signing the statement, and the various interpretations and legacies of the document.

Provides portraits and cameos of over sixty women who were influential in the Civil Rights Movement, and argues that the political activity of women has been the driving force in major reform movements throughout history.

Melt your face off with the guitar greats of Jacksonville. In the 1960s, the electric guitar became for boys what Barbie was for girls. Legions of bands formed, composed of teens making a ruckus in the garage. But who could have guessed how many world-renowned greats would arise from the clangor? Guitar gods came forth from Los Angeles, London, Chicago, Nashville. But there is a southern city often overlooked, an unlikely incubator that produced more than a dozen greats. Legends such as Dickey Betts, Dave Hlubek, Duane Allman, Jeff Carlisi, Mike Campbell and Derek Trucks emerged from Jacksonville, a far-flung city detached from the music hubs. Why did Jacksonville give rise to so many greats? Author Michael Ray FitzGerald explores the origins of this rocking story while paying tribute to the youngsters from Jax who joined the ranks of the guitar gods.

Before he was a civil rights leader, the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., was a man of the church. His father was a pastor, and much of young Martin's time was spent in Baptist churches. He went on to seminary and received a Ph.D. in theology. In 1953, he took over leadership of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Atlanta. The church was his home. But, as he began working for civil rights, King became a fierce critic of the churches, both black and white. He railed against white Christian leaders who urged him to be patient in the struggle - or even opposed civil rights altogether. And, while the black church was the platform from which King launched the struggle for civil rights, he was deeply ambivalent toward the church as an institution, and saw it as in constant need of reform. In this book, Lewis Baldwin explores King's complex relationship with the Christian church, from his days growing up at Ebenezer Baptist, to his work as a pastor, to his battles with American churches over civil rights, to his vision for the global church. King, Baldwin argues, had a robust and multifaceted view of the nature and purpose of the church that serves as a model for the church in the 21st century.

Traces the monumental battle waged by civil rights organizations and by local people to establish basic human rights for all citizens of Mississippi

In the summer of 1964, the turmoil of the civil rights movement reached its peak in Mississippi, with activists across the political spectrum claiming that God was on their side in the struggle over racial justice. This was the summer when violence against blacks increased at an alarming rate and when the murder of three civil rights workers in Mississippi resulted in national media attention. Charles Marsh takes us back to this place and time, when the lives of activists on all sides of the civil rights issue converged and their images of God clashed. He weaves their voices into a gripping narrative: a Ku Klux Klansman, for example, borrows fiery language from the Bible to link attacks on blacks to his "priestly calling"; a middle-aged woman describes how the Gospel inspired her to rally other African Americans to fight peacefully for their dignity; a SNCC worker tells of harrowing encounters with angry white mobs and his pilgrimage toward a new racial spirituality called Black Power. Through these emotionally charged stories, Marsh invites us to consider the civil rights movement anew, in terms of religion as a powerful yet protean force driving social action. The book's central figures are Fannie Lou Hamer, who "worked for Jesus" in civil rights activism; Sam Bowers, the Imperial Wizard of the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan of Mississippi; William Douglas Hudgins, an influential white Baptist pastor and unofficial theologian of the "closed society"; Ed King, a white Methodist minister and Mississippi native who campaigned to integrate Protestant congregations; and Cleveland Sellers, a SNCC staff member turned black militant. Marsh focuses on the events and religious convictions that led each person into the political upheaval of 1964. He presents an unforgettable American social landscape, one that is by turns shameful and inspiring. In conclusion, Marsh suggests that it may be possible to sift among these narratives and lay the groundwork for a new thinking about racial reconciliation and the beloved community. He maintains that the person who embraces faith's life-affirming energies will leave behind a most powerful legacy of social activism and compassion.