Memphis, Martin, and the Mountaintop
The Sanitation Strike of 1968
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- $10.99
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor Book • School Library Journal Best Book of the Year • Booklist Editors' Choice • Kirkus Reviews Best Children's Book • Booklist Top 10 Diverse Books for Middle Grade or Older Readers • Chicago Public Library Best of the Best Books
This award-winning book will help kids understand the life and legacy of Civil Rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
★"(A) history that everyone should know: required and inspired." —Kirkus Reviews
This picture book tells the story of a nine-year-old girl who in 1968 witnessed the Memphis sanitation strike - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s final stand for justice before his assassination - when her father, a sanitation worker, participated in the protest.
In February 1968, two African American sanitation workers were killed by unsafe equipment in Memphis, Tennessee. Outraged at the city's refusal to recognize a labor union that would fight for higher pay and safer working conditions, sanitation workers went on strike. The strike lasted two months, during which Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was called to help with the protests. While his presence was greatly inspiring to the community, this unfortunately would be his last stand for justice. He was assassinated in his Memphis hotel the day after delivering his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" sermon in Mason Temple Church. Inspired by the memories of a teacher who participated in the strike as a child, author Alice Faye Duncan reveals the story of the Memphis sanitation strike from the perspective of a young girl with a riveting combination of poetry and prose.
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Duncan relays the story of the 1968 Memphis sanitation strike, which was triggered after two black sanitation workers died when their poorly maintained truck malfunctioned. After the incident, Mayor Henry Loeb refused to meet the demands of the newly formed sanitation workers' union for better pay, treatment, and safety standards, and 1,300 men walked off the job. Duncan writes in fervent free verse from the perspective of Lorraine Jackson, a fictional girl whose father joins the strike and who is loosely based on Almella Starks-Umoja, a teacher who marched in strike protests with her parents as a child. Lorraine's narrative is passionate and personal: "My daddy... marched for better pay. He marched for decent treatment. My daddy marched for me." As violence erupts, and Martin Luther King Jr. arrives to deliver his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech the day before his assassination, the emotional tenor of Lorraine's story builds, cresting with the strike's settlement: "So much was won. So much was lost. Freedom is never free." Christie's vivid, emotive gouache paintings feature a montage of powerful panoramas and portraits, including those of the protesters, King, and Lorraine's family. Ages 9 12.