The Peddler's Grandson: Growing Up Jewish in Mississippi

Edward Cohen grew up in Jackson, Mississippi, the heart of the Bible Belt, thousands of miles from the northern centers of Jewish culture. As a child he sang "Dixie" in his segregated school, said the "sh'ma" at temple. While the civil rights struggle exploded all around, he worked at the family clothing store that catered to blacks.

His grandfather Moise had left Romania and all his family for a very different world, the Deep South. Peddling on foot from farm to farm, sleeping in haylofts, ...