Going Down Jericho Road: The Memphis Strike, Martin Luther King's Last CampaignThe definitive history of the epic struggle for economic justice that became Martin Luther King Jr.'s last crusade. Memphis in 1968 was ruled by a paternalistic "plantation mentality" embodied in its good-old-boy mayor, Henry Loeb. Wretched conditions, abusive white supervisors, poor education, and low wages locked most black workers into poverty. Then two sanitation workers were chewed up like garbage in the back of a faulty truck, igniting a public employee strike that brought to a boil long-simmering issues of racial injustice.With novelistic drama and rich scholarly detail, Michael Honey brings to life the magnetic characters who clashed on the Memphis battlefield: stalwart black workers; fiery black ministers; volatile, young, black-power advocates; idealistic organizers and tough-talking unionists; the first black members of the Memphis city council; the white upper crust who sought to prevent change or conflagration; and, finally, the magisterial Martin Luther King Jr., undertaking a Poor People's Campaign at the crossroads of his life, vilified as a subversive, hounded by the FBI, and seeing in the working poor of Memphis his hopes for a better America. |
Contents
1 | |
7 | |
23 | |
STRUGGLES OF THE WORKING POOR | 50 |
STANDING AT THE CROSSROADS | 76 |
ON STRIKE FOR RESPECT | 98 |
THE FAILURE | 128 |
TESTING THE SOCIAL GOSPEL | 151 |
JERICHO ROAD IS A DANGEROUS ROAD | 333 |
CHAOS IN THE BLUFF CITY | 335 |
THE MOVEMENT LIVES OR DIES IN MEMPHIS | 362 |
STATE OF SIEGE | 382 |
SHATTERED DREAMS AND PROMISED LANDS | 400 |
A CRUCIFIXION EVENT | 427 |
RECKONINGS | 451 |
WE HAVE GOT THE VICTORY | 483 |
FIGHTING FOR THE WORKING POOR | 171 |
THE POOR PEOPLES CAMPAIGN | 173 |
BAPTISM BY FIRE | 191 |
MINISTERS AND MANHOOD | 211 |
CONVERGENCE | 240 |
THE YOUTH MOVEMENT | 260 |
ALL LABOR HAS DIGNITY | 287 |
SOMETHING DREADFUL | 309 |
Other editions - View all
Going Down Jericho Road: The Memphis Strike, Martin Luther King's Last Campaign Michael K. Honey No preview available - 2008 |
Going Down Jericho Road: The Memphis Strike Kings Last Campaign Michael Honey No preview available - 2006 |
Common terms and phrases
Abernathy activists AFL-CIO African Americans AFSCME April Arkin Report arrested attorney began Beifuss black community black ministers Black Power black workers black youth Blackburn boycott Cabbage called campaign church Ciampa City Council city’s civil rights movement Clayborn Temple Commercial Appeal Communist Crump downtown FBI/MSS February February 16 fired freedom garbage Henry Loeb Holloman Ibid Invaders Jackson Jesse King’s Kyles labor leaders Loeb’s Lorraine Motel Lucy March 29 marchers Martin Luther King mass meeting Maxine Smith Mayor Loeb Memphians Memphis Memphis movement Mississippi NAACP Negro night nonviolent organizing picket political Poor People's Poor People's Campaign poverty President protest racial racism Reverend riot River Rustin sanitation workers saying SCLC segregation South southern SSC Video Stokely Carmichael streets strikers struggle Sugarmon T. O. Jones talk Tennessee tion told trucks union unionists violence vote wages wanted Wurf young