About this item
The Civil Rights Chronicle recounts the details and drama of the American civil rights movement, the decades-long struggle for equality for all people. This comprehensive, 448-page book primarily focuses on the years 1954 through 1968, while also documenting the radical shift in the movement after the 1960s as well as significant civil rights issues up to the present day. Written by noted scholars, the chronicle offers: A foreword by Myrlie Evers-Williams, wife of former NAACP field secretary Medgar Evers, who was assassinated in 1963. A 1,200-item timeline that marks significant points along the battle for civil rights, from the Brown v. Topeka Board of Education decision to the assassination of movement leader Martin Luther King, Jr. Essays describing 26 watershed events, such as the Montgomery bus boycott, crisis at Little Rock High School, sit-ins, and freedom rides.
About the Author
I am a historian who teaches at Stanford University, where I also serve as founding director of the Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute. My latest book -- Martin's Dream: My Journey and the Legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. -- is a memoir of my experiences during the half century since I attended the 1963 March on Washington.
The late Mrs. Coretta Scott King selected me in 1985 to edit and publish the papers of her late husband and, since then, I have devoted most of my professional life to the study of Martin Luther King, Jr., and the movements King inspired. Under my direction, the King Papers Project, a component of the King Institute, has produced six volumes of a definitive, comprehensive edition of speeches, sermons, correspondence, publications, and unpublished writings. I have also edited numerous other books based on King's papers.
A member of Stanford's department of history since receiving my doctorate from UCLA in 1975, I have also served as visiting professor or visiting fellow at American University, the University of California, Berkeley, Duke University, Emory University, Harvard University, the Center for the Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford, the L'Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris, and at Morehouse College in Atlanta, where during 2009 I was Martin Luther King, Jr. Distinguished Professor and Executive Director of that institution's King Collection.
My writings reflect not only my research about King but also my undergraduate civil rights and antiwar activism, which led me to appreciate the importance of grassroots political activity as well as visionary leadership in the African-American freedom struggle. My first book, In Struggle: SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960s, published in 1981, is a study of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, the most dynamic and innovative civil rights organization. In Struggle won the Organization of American Historians' Frederick Jackson Turner Award. My other publications include Malcolm X: The FBI File (1991) . I also co-authored African American Lives: The Struggle for Freedom (2005) , a comprehensive survey of African-American history.
In addition to The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr., my other works based on the papers include The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr. (1998) , compiled from the King's autobiographical writings, A Knock at Midnight: Inspiration from the Great Sermons of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. (1998) , and A Call to Conscience: The Landmark Speeches of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2001) .
My writings also include a play, "Passages of Martin Luther King," which was initially produced by Stanford's Drama Department in 1993, and subsequently performed at Dartmouth College, Willamette University, the Claremont Colleges, the University of Washington, Tacoma, St. Petersburg, and o
