Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement

Description

An eloquent, epic firsthand account of the civil rights movement by a man who lived it-an American hero whose courage, vision, and dedication helped change history. The son of an Alabama sharecropper, and now a sixth-term United States Congressman, John Lewis has led an extraordinary life, one that found him at the epicenter of the civil rights movement in the late '50s and '60s. As Chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), Lewis was present at all the major battlefields of the movement. Arrested more than forty times and severely beaten on several occasions, he was one of the youngest yet most courageous leaders. Written with charm, warmth, and honesty, Walking with the Wind offers rare insight into the movement and the personalities of all the civil rights leaders-what was happening behind the scenes, the infighting, struggles, and triumphs. Lewis takes us from the Nashville lunch counter sit-ins to the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, where he led more than five hundred marchers on what became known as "Bloody Sunday." While there have been exceptional books on the movement, there has never been a front-line account by a man like John Lewis. A true American hero, his story is "destined to become a classic in civil rights literature." (Los Angeles Times) Title Copyright Acknowledgements Epigraph Contents Prologue Part One Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Part Two Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Part Three Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Part Four Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Part Five Chapter Thirteen Chapter Fourteen Chapter Fifteen Part Six Chapter Sixteen Chapter Seventeen Chapter Eighteen Part Seven Chapter Nineteen Chapter Twenty Chapter Twenty-One Index Index 476 Index 477 Index 478 Index 479 Index 480 Index 481 Index 482 Index 483 Index 484 Index 485 Index 486 Index 487 Index 488 Index 489 Index 490 Index 491 Index 492 Index 493 Index 494 Index 495 Index 496 Photo Credits Author Praise