How a Family of Chinese Immigrants Led the First Fight to Desegregate Schools in the Jim Crow South
August 1, 2016
Berard (Love and War) tells the story of the Lum family, a Chinese American family living in the Jim Crow–era South, from the father’s perilous arrival to the United States in the winter of 1904 during a time of anti-immigration sentiment to the 1927 lawsuit Gong Lum v. Rice, the first Supreme Court decision against school segregation. Berard conveys why Jeu Gong Lum wanted better lives—and better schools—for his two daughters, particularly Martha, who was a straight-A student, during a time when segregated black schools often had inadequate facilities. But the book does not go into detail about the poor conditions of black public schools, so when Katherine Lum says, “I don’t want my children to attend ‘colored’ schools” and one of their lawyers argues that “the Mongolian is on the hither side... between the Caucasian and African” as the premise of the case, a current of antiblack sentiment overwhelms a story of an immigrant family simply wanting the best for their children. As a result, this divisive narrative that focuses less on the importance of obtaining freedom and a better education for all U.S. citizens than on how one family fought to secure privilege for their children. Agent: Anna Ghosh, Ghosh Literary.
The story of a family of Chinese immigrants who influenced desegregation in the South.While researching her own family history in the Mississippi Delta, Berard came across the untold story of how a Chinese immigrant family fought the state's school segregation laws. Using newspaper clippings, weather reports, interviews with descendants, census records, maps, photographs, and letters, the author re-creates the early 1900s in the Delta region, an area filled with prejudiced whites, recently freed blacks, and thousands of Chinese who had come to America in search of a better life. One of those families was the Lums, who lived in Rosedale, Mississippi, where they owned and ran a grocery store. The two daughters, Berda and Martha, attended the local school along with the white children of the area. But in 1924, due to pervasive racism, the girls were labeled as "colored" and barred from returning to school. Berard brings their story and those of the other players to life, giving readers a close look at the social, economic, and cultural environment of the Deep South in the early 20th century. Significant, memorable details include the fields of cotton being picked by hand, the black prison gangs being worked to death building levees, and the KKK murdering innocent black men. Berard gives the background histories of the lawyer, Earl Brewer, who presented the case before the Mississippi Supreme Court, the Klansmen who influenced the situation, and the judges who tried the case and ultimately decided the girls were not permitted in the "whites only" school. In an engaging bit of social history, Berard rescues a forgotten part of Southern history and brings it to light, offering readers a rare glimpse into Chinese immigrant life and the way segregation affected so many for decades. Flush with telling details and backed by meticulous research, a piece of near-forgotten Chinese-American history is retold. COPYRIGHT(1) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
October 15, 2016
Berard (Love and War) makes mostly good on her intention to illuminate the lives of the Chinese immigrant Lum family who lodged an early desegregation effort in 1920s Mississippi. In the appeal to allow their daughter to continue her education among the white peers she matriculated with throughout her years at the local school, the family enlisted the help of former governor Earl Brewer. Brewer and the legal machinations of the family's efforts briefly overtake the narrative and readers may lose sight of the Lum family; however, they circle back into the spotlight at the end. Berard makes solid use of research materials, such as city directories, but more information on the Lums would have been helpful in presenting a fuller picture of family ambitions. The volume does provide a fresh perspective on what was left behind when so many African American citizens fled the South as part of the Great Migration. VERDICT Potentially useful for students of specifically Asian American or Southern history.--Jewell Anderson, Savannah Country Day Sch. Lib., GA
Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
September 1, 2016
Thirty years before Brown v. Board of Education struck down segregation in public schools, a Chinese American family in the Mississippi Delta fought to continue their daughter's education. On September 15, 1924, Rosedale School's principal banned nine-and-a-half-year-old, straight-A student Martha Lum and her older sister from school because of their colored Chinese ancestry. The Lum family decided to fight, and their lawsuit became the first U.S. Supreme Court case to challenge the constitutionality of segregation in Southern public schools. Filed by former Mississippi Governor Earl Brewer, the case took on a Southern gothic-like legal cast, ending with twenty-seventh president-turned-chief justice William Taft writing the final decision. Although the writing is a bit uneven, with clumsy attempts at florid language ( daughters of an ancient nation called China ) and repetition in spite of the book's slim size, Berard's intention to restore Gong Lum v. Rice to its rightful place in history is undeniably noble. And the fact that the school district where the Lums filed suit remains segregated almost a century later is sobering proof of the book's significance.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)
August 15, 2016
The story of a family of Chinese immigrants who influenced desegregation in the South.While researching her own family history in the Mississippi Delta, Berard came across the untold story of how a Chinese immigrant family fought the state's school segregation laws. Using newspaper clippings, weather reports, interviews with descendants, census records, maps, photographs, and letters, the author re-creates the early 1900s in the Delta region, an area filled with prejudiced whites, recently freed blacks, and thousands of Chinese who had come to America in search of a better life. One of those families was the Lums, who lived in Rosedale, Mississippi, where they owned and ran a grocery store. The two daughters, Berda and Martha, attended the local school along with the white children of the area. But in 1924, due to pervasive racism, the girls were labeled as colored and barred from returning to school. Berard brings their story and those of the other players to life, giving readers a close look at the social, economic, and cultural environment of the Deep South in the early 20th century. Significant, memorable details include the fields of cotton being picked by hand, the black prison gangs being worked to death building levees, and the KKK murdering innocent black men. Berard gives the background histories of the lawyer, Earl Brewer, who presented the case before the Mississippi Supreme Court, the Klansmen who influenced the situation, and the judges who tried the case and ultimately decided the girls were not permitted in the whites only school. In an engaging bit of social history, Berard rescues a forgotten part of Southern history and brings it to light, offering readers a rare glimpse into Chinese immigrant life and the way segregation affected so many for decades. Flush with telling details and backed by meticulous research, a piece of near-forgotten Chinese-American history is retold.
COPYRIGHT(2016) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.