Civil Rights Biography

John B. McLendon was the last living protégé of basketball’s inventor Dr. James Naismith and one of the “top ten basketball coaches of the century” in Billy Packer’s opinion. McLendon’s amazing records in college and pro basketball earned him a spot in the Basketball Hall of Fame (the first Black coach to be inducted), and his coaching philosophy has had a huge influence on basketball coaches.

The summer of 1964 had been "Freedom Summer" for a few campuses. The Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) had drawn some 500 students, most of them White, from Ivy League and prestigious universities to help its integration efforts in Mississippi. An up-and-coming leader named Stokely Carmichael had told a group of prospective volunteers in New York that SNCC wanted to be sure that if Blacks were killed for the civil rights cause, Whites would die with them.

Keith Hatschek tells the story of three determined artists: Louis Armstrong, Dave Brubeck, and Iola Brubeck and the stand they took against segregation by writing and performing a jazz musical titled The Real Ambassadors. First conceived by the Brubecks in 1956, the musical's journey to the stage for its 1962 premiere tracks extraordinary twists and turns across the backdrop of the civil rights movement.

This first comprehensive biography of Jewish American writer and humorist Harry Golden (1903-1981) - author of the 1958 national best seller Only in America - illuminates a remarkable life intertwined with the rise of the civil rights movement, Jewish popular culture, and the sometimes precarious position of Jews in the South and across America during the 1950s.

Millicent E. Brown's family home at 270 Ashley Avenue in Charleston, South Carolina, was a center of civil rights activity. There Brown gained intimate knowledge of the struggle for racial justice, and those experiences set her on a life course dedicated to the civil rights struggle. Best known as the named plaintiff in the federal court case that, in 1963, forced the initial desegregation of public schools in South Carolina, her experiences as an activist range across years and well beyond her native state. Another Sojourner Looking for Truth is Brown's insightful reflection.

In the dramatic and tension-filled months of 1965 that led up to the Voting Rights March from Selma to Montgomery, King and other national leaders, including Ralph David Abernathy and John Lewis, held strategy sessions at the Jackson house and met with Assistant Attorney General John Doar to negotiate plans for the march.

Born in Hamburg in the 1930s, Marione Ingram fled Nazi Germany only to find racism as pervasive in the American South as anti-Semitism was in Europe. As a white woman and a Holocaust refugee, Marione was the most unlikely of heroes in the fight for civil rights for African Americans. This is her empowering story - a tale of courage, strength, and determination.

Three simple words that provided Kathryn Johnson, a reporter for The Associated Press' Atlanta bureau, unprecedented access to the grieving widow in the days following her husband's death. Johnson was on her way to a movie date when word came from Memphis that Martin Luther King Jr. had been assassinated. She immediately headed for the King home where, despite resistance from authorities on the scene, she was the only reporter allowed inside.

James Meredith's 1966 march in Mississippi began as one man's peaceful protest for voter registration and became one of the South's most important demonstrations of the civil rights movement. It brought together leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. and Stokely Carmichael, who formed an unlikely alliance that resulted in the Black Power movement, which ushered in a new era in the fight for equality. The retelling of Meredith's story opens on the day of his assassination attempt and goes back in time to recount the moments leading up to that event and its aftermath.

Raised in Charlotte, North Carolina, in the heart of Jim Crow, Dovey Johnson Roundtree felt the sting of inequality at an early age and made a point to speak up for justice. She was one of the first Black women to break the racial and gender barriers in the US Army when women were barely allowed to serve; a fierce attorney in the segregated courtrooms of Washington, DC; and a minister in Black churches, where women had never before had the chance to speak.

A comprehensive biographical and critical reading of the works of American poet and memoirist Maya Angelou (1928-2014). Linda Wagner-Martin covers all six of Angelou's autobiographies, as well as her essay and poetry collections, while also exploring Angelou's life as an African American in the United States, her career as stage and film performer, her thoughtful participation in the Civil Rights actions of the 1960s, and her travels abroad in Egypt, Africa, and Europe.

In Becoming King: Martin Luther King Jr. and the Making of a National Leader, author Troy Jackson chronicles King's emergence and effectiveness as a civil rights leader by examining his relationship with the people of Montgomery, Alabama. Using the sharp lens of Montgomery's struggle for racial equality to investigate King's burgeoning leadership, Jackson explores King's ability to connect with the educated and the unlettered, professionals and the working class.

A riveting work of literary journalism that explores the infamous police killing of Eric Garner - from the New York Times best-selling author of The Divide.

This eye-opening memoir tells the story of a young girl's life in Syria, her family's wrenching decision to leave their home, and the upheaval of life in a refugee camp. Though her life had utterly changed, one thing remained the same. She knew that education was the key to a better future—for herself, and so that she could help her country. She went from tent to tent in the camp, trying to convince other kids, especially girls, to come to school. And her passion and dedication soon had people calling her the "Malala of Syria."

Dorothy L. Sayers is now famous for her Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane detective series, but she was equally well known during her life for an essay asking “Are Women Human?” Women’s rights were expanding rapidly during Sayers’s lifetime; she and her friends were some of the first women to receive degrees from Oxford. Yet, as historian Mo Moulton reveals, it was clear from the many professional and personal obstacles they faced that society was not ready to concede that women were indeed fully human.

Drawing on interviews with surviving players, sportswriters, and eyewitnesses, as well as newly discovered material from archives around the country, Jonathan Eig presents a fresh portrait of a ferocious competitor who embodied integration's promise and helped launch the modern civil-rights era. Full of new details and thrilling action, Opening Day brings to life baseball's ultimate story.

Stokely Carmichael, the charismatic and controversial Black activist, stepped onto the pages of history when he called for "Black Power" during a speech one humid Mississippi night in 1966. Carmichael’s life changed that day, and so did America’s struggle for civil rights. "Black Power" became the slogan of an era, provoking a national reckoning on race and democracy. In Stokely, preeminent civil rights scholar Peniel E. Joseph presents a groundbreaking biography of Carmichael.

Dr. William Edward DuBois pioneered the science of sociology. His detailed long-range study of an African American community in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, was the first of its kind. DuBois hoped that knowledge, and the ensuing understanding, might lessen the prejudice against African Americans. Later DuBois sought more radical methods of countering racism. DuBois helped found the Niagara Movement and the NAACP, and became the editor of Crisis, the NAACP's journal.

An urgent, essential, and practical call to action from the co-founder of Extinction Rebellion. The climate crisis threatens global social collapse. Within a generation. What to do? Common Sense for the 21st Century outlines how movements around the world now need to come together to start doing "what works". This means engaging in mass civil disobedience to make real change happen. This booklet is not just theory, it is the call to action. The political class is not going to save us from extinction.

James E. Rix, a Memphis native, shares a lifetime of experiences intertwining basketball, civil rights, and personal growth in his debut book, “A Life of Basketball, Civil Rights and Beyond.” This narrative is a testament to resilience and the pursuit of dreams against all odds.