Synopses & Reviews
In the mid-1950s, Septima Poinsette Clark (1898-1987), a former public school teacher, developed a citizenship training program that enabled thousands of African Americans to register to vote and then to link the power of the ballot to concrete strategies for individual and communal empowerment. In this vibrantly written biography, Katherine Charron demonstrates Clark's crucial role--and the role of many black women teachers--in making education a cornerstone of the twentieth-century freedom struggle. Using Clark's life as a lens, Charron sheds valuable new light on southern black women's activism in national, state, and judicial politics, from the Progressive Era to the civil rights movement and beyond.
Review
"A compelling story, beautifully written, Freedom's Teacher traces a life that intersected with key elements and players in the unfolding civil rights movement. Charron's powerful work also demonstrates the ways in which Septima Clark drew on rich traditions in black history to influence and shape her people's quest for freedom and social justice."--Elizabeth Jacoway, author of Turn Away Thy Son: Little Rock, the Crisis That Shocked the Nation
Review
"When Martin Luther King Jr. received his Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, he insisted that Septima Clark accompany him to Stockholm. King recognized the critical role Clark played in the civil rights movement. Perhaps more effectively than anyone else, Clark blended legal and direct action. In this important contribution to the history of the civil rights movement, Charron presents a powerful and moving portrait of Septima Clark and highlights some of the ways African American women defined the role of citizenship schools. Charron offers a fresh perspective and challenges our understanding of this critical period. Remarkable for its precision, intelligence, and heart, this thoughtful narrative demonstrates the enormous diversity of the movement."--Orville Vernon Burton, Burroughs Chair of Southern History and Culture, Coastal Carolina University
Review
"Freedom's Teacher is at once an intimate biography of a civil rights leader and a sweeping reconsideration of the civil rights era. By placing the schoolhouse alongside the church as a key site of struggle, bringing to visibility a hidden history of black women's educational activism, and demonstrating the subtle interplay of race and gender, Katherine Charron allows us to see both women's leadership and the freedom struggle in a revelatory new light."--Jacquelyn Dowd Hall, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Review
"In Charron's capable hands, [Septima] Clark's life has at long last received the full-length attention it deserves."
-Oral History Review
Review
"More than a biography."
-Oral History Review
Review
"Charron's stunning, eminently readable writing style pulls the reader in from the outset with opening lines that approach synesthesia. . . . Any biographers would find this work amazing and a worthy addition to their libraries. Any historian of the civil rights movements would be well suited to pick this up as background and context for understanding a leader and pioneer. A general reader would not be put off by academic prose or overreliance on either citations or notations."
-H-Net Reviews
Review
"This biography will enlighten anyone interested in the black freedom struggle, the classic phase of the civil rights movement, and women's history."
-Tennessee Historical Review
Review
"[In this] comprehensive and thoroughly engrossing biography. . . . Katherine Charron artfully presents the full breadth of the life and career of Septima Clark."
-Journal of African American History
Synopsis
In this vibrantly written biography, Katherine Charron demonstrates Clark's crucial role--and the role of many black women teachers--in making education a cornerstone of the twentieth-century freedom struggle. Using Clark's life as a lens, Charron sheds valuable new light on southern black women's activism in national, state, and judicial politics, from the Progressive Era to the civil rights movement and beyond.