Witness in Philadelphia / Edition 1

by Florence Mars

Overview

On June 21, 1964, three young civil rights workers—James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner—were murdered near Philadelphia, Mississippi. Florence Mars, a native of Philadelphia, recounts the grim circumstances of the killings and describes what happened to a community confronted by a challenge to long-held beliefs.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780807115664
Publisher:	Louisiana State University Press
Publication date:	02/01/1989
Series:	Southern Literary Studies
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Florence Mars, who has spent most of her life in Neshoba County, Mississippi, has also lived in Atlanta and New Orleans. A freelance photographer, many of whose photographs illustrate this book, Mars has had pictures of Mississippi rural scenes and New Orleans architecture, parades, and jazz bands in such publications as the New York Times and Time.

Editorial Reviews

Witness in Philadelphia is a detailed, documented, yet personal account of the upheaval that shook Neshoba County, Mississippi, when the civil rights movement began to make itself felt in the 1960s.

The Nation

[Florence Mars] spoke out at a time, when it was physically dangerous to do so, and she speaks out now to make a record before history. . . . [Witness in Philadelphia] should be in every school in the country, to teach young people what the unmasked face of bigotry looks like and about the quiet, difficult courage of ordinary people like Florence Mars.

New York Times

Florence Mars’s moving account of how she stood against her town and the county in which eight of her great-grandparents were buried helps to explain why it was possible in the 1960s for the Old South to become the New South.

The Wilson Quarterly

Florence Mars is both a symbol and a living practitioner of the belief that people who are willing to challenge injustice can prevail.

Andrew Young

The author was one of the few residents of Philadelphia, Miss., to vigorously protest the 1964 murder of Northern civil rights workers James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner. ``More than an affecting personal story, her book incisively portrays the psychology of a town in the grip of bigotry and hatred . . . well worth reading,'' maintained PW. Photos. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly