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xix ACKNOWLEDGMENTS M y acknowledgments have grown over the years as this project moved from Yale College and Law School, to the civil rights organizations SNCC and CORE, to the American Studies and History programs at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv University, to the W. E. B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research and its professors, fellows and staff at Harvard University, to Elaine Hall and Cynthia Lewis at the King Center in Atlanta, and through discussions with civil rights activists and numerous individuals and scholars such as Bob Zellner, Julian Bond, Marvin Rich, Norman and Velma Hill, Sally Belfrage, Tim Jenkins, William Julius Wilson, Linda Haywood, John Thornton, Doug McAdam, Clayborne Carson, Wesley C. Hogan, Connie Curry, Bruce Payne, Steve Bingham, Susie Erenrich, and John Ameer, who encouraged me along the way. This is not to forget Howard Zinn and W. Haywood Burns, who mentored me and encouraged me in my work over the years until their passing. Julian Bond and Jack Minnis opened up the SNCC files to me in 1965 in Atlanta , and James Farmer and Marvin Rich did the same at the National CORE office in New York before anyone was putting documents away in archives. Movement people devoted their time to recording interviews with me, particularly Tim Jenkins and Bob Moses, and many many others who spent time with me clarifying facts and events. Without them I am very sure this book would never have seen the light of day. Those people I interviewed who are still with us have gratefully provided permissions for me to publish sections of what they related to me. Without them I would not have been able to delineate the process of development of the Mississippi civil rights movement. My initial study grew from a senior paper with interview transcriptions at Yale into a very long master’s thesis at the Hebrew University with documents, statistical studies, and maps. Staughton Lynd continued to critique my work; xx acknowledgments Howard Zinn read my thesis, gave me documents from his collection, and mentored me; and Professor Henry Louis Gates read and circulated my manuscript for me. While I was living in Israel, the following professors and scholars were very helpful in keeping me focused on pushing this project forward: Yehoshua Arieli and David Ricci at the Hebrew University, Sigmund Diamond and Stanley I. Kutler as guest lecturers, Elite Olshtain and Lloyd Gartner at Tel Aviv University , and Gideon Stachel, my teaching colleague. In the late 1980s my manuscript landed on the desk of Louisiana State University Press for the first time, and they encouraged me to turn my thesis into a publishable book. Happily I have renewed my relationship with LSU Press. There senior editor Rand Dotson, cartographer Mary Lee Eggert, and copyeditor Stan Ivester have graciously and professionally shepherded me through the processing of the book. Today I look forward to my life project finally seeing the light of day. ...

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