Pillar of fire : America in the King years, 1963-65 / Taylor Branch.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Branch, Taylor.

Series:

America in the King years ; no. 2.

America in the King years ; no. 2

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

King, Martin Luther, Jr., 1929-1968.

King, Martin Luther.

African Americans--Civil rights.

African Americans.

Civil rights movements--United States--History--20th century.

Civil rights movements.

United States--History--1961-1969.

United States.

Genre:

History.

Physical Description:

xiv, 746 pages, 24 pages of plates : illustrations ; 25 cm

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : Simon & Schuster, ©1998.

Summary:

In Pillar of Fire, the second volume of his America in the King Years trilogy, Taylor Branch portrays the civil rights era at its zenith. The first volume, Parting the Waters, won the Pulitzer Prize for History. Pillar of Fire covers the far-flung upheavals of the years 1963 to 1965 - Dallas, St. Augustine, Mississippi Freedom Summer, LBJ's Great Society and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Vietnam, Selma. And it provides a frank, revealing portrait of Martin Luther King, Jr. - haunted by blackmail, factionalism, and hatred while he tried to hold the nonviolent movement together as a dramatic force in history. Allies, rivals, and opponents addressed racial issues that went deeper than fair treatment at bus stops or lunch counters. Participants on all sides stretched themselves and their country to the breaking point over the meaning of simple words: dignity, equal votes, equal souls. Branch brings to bear fifteen years of research - archival investigation; nearly two thousand interviews; new primary sources, from FBI wiretaps to White House telephone recordings - in a seminal work of history.

From Pulitzer Prize-winning author Taylor Branch, the second part of his epic trilogy on the American Civil Rights Movement. In the second volume of his three-part history, a monumental trilogy that began with Parting the Waters, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award, Taylor Branch portrays the Civil Rights Movement at its zenith, recounting the climactic struggles as they commanded the national stage. - Publisher.

Contents:

Pt. 1: Birmingham tides

Islam in Los Angeles

Prophets in Chicago

LBJ in St. Augustine

Gamblers in law

To vote in Mississippi: advance by retreat

Tremors: L.A. to Selma

Marx in the White House

Summer freeze

Calvary: Lowenstein and the church

Mirrors in black and white

Against all enemies

Frontiers on edge: the last month

Pt. 2: new worlds passing

Grief

High councils

Hattiesburg Freedom Day

Ambush

Spreading poisons

The creation of Muhammad Ali

Shaky pulpits

Mary Peabody meets the Klan

Wrestling with legends

Filibusters

Pilgrims and empty pitchers

Brushfires

Pt. 3: freedom summer

Jail marches

Bogue Chitto Swamp

Beachheads

Testing freedom

The Cow Palace Revolt

King in Mississippi

Riot politics

Crime, war, and freedom school

White House etiquette

A dog in the manger: the Atlantic City compromise

"We see the giants . . ."

Movements unbound

Pt. 4: "Lord, make me pure-but not yet"

Landslide

Nobel Prize

To the valley: the downward King

Saigon, Audubon, and Selma.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 620-716) and index.

Local Notes:

The Pennsylvania Abolition Society Complementary Collection.

ISBN:

0684808196

9780684808192

0684848090

9780684848099

OCLC:

37909869

Online:

Booknotes episode and transcript Program air date: April 12, 1998

Contributor biographical information

Publisher description