Seeds of Freedom: The Peaceful Integration of Huntsville, Alabama

by Hester Bass, E.B. Lewis (Illustrator)

Overview

“Unflinchingly honest and jubilantly hopeful, this is nonfiction storytelling at its best.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Mention the civil rights era in Alabama and most people recall images of terrible violence. But for the citizens of Huntsville, creativity, courage, and cooperation were the keys to working together to integrate their city and schools in peace. This engaging celebration of a lesser-known chapter in American and African-American history shows how racial discrimination, bullying, and unfairness can be faced successfully with perseverance and ingenuity.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780763669195
Publisher:	Candlewick Press
Publication date:	01/27/2015
Pages:	32
Sales rank:	622,715
Product dimensions:	9.70(w) x 10.70(h) x 1.80(d)
Lexile:	AD830L (what's this?)
Age Range:	5 - 8 Years

About the Author

  

Editorial Reviews

★ 11/17/2014
A small girl sits on a chair in a store, solemnly holding a piece of paper with the outlines of her feet drawn on it. This is how African Americans shopped for shoes in Huntsville, Ala., prior to the civil rights movement, because their feet weren’t allowed inside shoes that might be touched by whites. It’s one of many indelible vignettes in this engrossing and heart-wrenching history from the duo behind The Secret World of Walter Anderson, which culminates in Huntsville’s schools being the first to integrate in the state. Bass’s forthright, passionate prose and Lewis’s searing, expansively imagined watercolors take readers to a time and place when the New Frontier’s rockets (Huntsville was a NASA field center) heralded American exceptionalism and pride, while bigotry and discrimination were justified as “just the way it is.” As Bass and Lewis show, once the “seeds of freedom” took root, there was no turning back; when ordinary people were willing to speak truth to power and risk everything for justice, they changed the world. Unflinchingly honest and jubilantly hopeful, this is nonfiction storytelling at its best. Ages 5–8. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

01/01/2015
Gr 2–5—This gentle, reflective book shares a story of the civil rights movement, one that is perhaps less known but no less powerful than many others. Huntsville, AL, was considered a space center, with NASA's George C. Marshall Space Flight Center and a few supporting satellite companies in the area, and the call for change that was sweeping through the South followed a slightly different path in this town. Bass shares how African Americans looking for change pursued many of the same avenues that were used throughout the country including boycotts and sit-ins. But unlike the violent clashes that occurred in other communities between white residents and protestors, the people of Huntsville were a bit more reluctant to use violence. Many white citizens relied on the space industry for their income, and to antagonize the federal government could mean the loss of jobs and a weakening of the local economy, and thus, a more peaceful transition to desegregation and more equal treatments happened in Huntsville than in many other places. Lewis's trademark watercolor paintings pair perfectly with this lyrical recounting of events, and he masterfully moves between detailed illustrations depicting faces of grim determination of lunch counter patrons to the more impressionistic scenes of protesters facing water hoses. The book covers quite a bit of ground, both in time and content and can be long for a read-aloud, but it's well worth the time to share such a moving, inspirational story.—Jody Kopple, Shady Hill School, Cambridge, MA

School Library Journal

2014-10-15
Peaceful but forceful protest ended segregation in one Southern town.The titular "seeds" are a metaphor for individual acts of nonviolence that led to desegregation in the city that is home to the George C. Marshall Space Flight Center, a federally funded facility. In the early 1960s, blacks staged sit-ins at lunch counters, listened to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and, before Easter, boycotted local clothing stores and participated in a Blue Jean Sunday. Bass writes in the present tense with a conversational tone and divides her story by date from July 1962 through September 1963. She includes details that will resonate with children while also imparting an inspirational message, tinged with her own civic pride (she is a former resident of Huntsville), about community activism. Lewis' watercolor art portrays street scenes and townspeople's faces. His full-page portrait of a little black girl in ruffled white ankle socks, holding a paper outline of her feet, is the most telling and poignant. She wants a new pair of shoes but cannot try them on. It's an unfortunately timely book, as Huntsville is still in the news with court cases challenging de facto school segregation. A book that is as quietly inspiring as its subject. (author's note, photographs, selected bibliography) (Informational picture book. 5-8)

Kirkus Reviews

An engrossing and heart-wrenching history... Bass’s forthright, passionate prose and Lewis’s searing, expansively imagined watercolors take readers to a time and place when the New Frontier’s rockets heralded American exceptionalism and pride, while bigotry and discrimination were justified as “just the way it is.” ... Unflinchingly honest and jubilantly hopeful, this is nonfiction storytelling at its best.
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

The use of present tense gives a great sense of immediacy to the text as it transports readers into the past to watch events unfold. The relatively peaceful changes in Huntsville are briefly contrasted with the violence in Birmingham around the same time. Capturing the period with finesse, Lewis’ expressive watercolor paintings record the events and settings in beautifully composed scenes. His portrayal of people is particularly fine, conveying the personalities, attitudes, and emotions of individuals as well as the essential dignity of the nonviolent protesters. A valuable introduction to the civil rights period.
—Booklist (starred review)

Bass writes in the present tense with a conversational tone... She includes details that will resonate with children while also imparting an inspirational message, tinged with her own civic pride (she is a former resident of Huntsville), about community activism. ... A book that is as quietly inspiring as its subject.
—Kirkus Reviews

Lewis’s trademark watercolor paintings pair perfectly with this lyrical recounting of events, and he masterfully moves between detailed illustrations depicting faces of grim determination of lunch counter patrons to the more impressionistic scenes of protesters facing water hoses. The book covers quite a bit of ground, both in time and content and can be long for a read-aloud, but it’s well worth the time to share such a moving, inspirational story.
—School Library Journal

Making good use of the title metaphor, Bass does an excellent job of acknowledging difficulties—and harrowing events in other parts of the South—and work still to be done, while also emphasizing the “nonviolence and dignity, and cooperation and courage” of a community that carefully nurtured freedom, from seeds gently sown to “sweet fruit.” Lewis’s lovely, realistic paintings depict time and place, underscoring both the steely determination and soaring hopefulness of ordinary people dedicated to initiating change. Both informative and rousing, this book is a solid choice for studies of the civil rights movement and more generalized discussion of peaceful protest and the effectiveness of grass-roots efforts.
—SLJ Curriculum Connections

E.B. Lewis’s watercolor illustrations depict the town, streets, and people with revealing heartfelt emotions but also representing civic pride in their community. This informative picture book shows a community creatively coming together without resorting to violence.
—Literacy Daily

Throughout this engaging story about Huntsville's peaceful uprising, Bass skillfully intertwines the history of the civil rights movement. Lewis's watercolor illustrations portray momentous events like snapshots in a photo album. "Seeds of Freedom" is a stirring revelation of how the skirmishes and successes of one community caused a giant ripple across the nation.
—Children's Bookwatch

An extraordinarily powerful true story, this selection is a must-read.
—from Kendal Rautzhan

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