Daybreak of Freedom: The Montgomery Bus Boycott [Paperback]

Stewart (ed.) Burns (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 1997

The Montgomery bus boycott was a formative moment in twentieth-century history: a harbinger of the African American freedom movement, a springboard for the leadership of Martin Luther King Jr., and a crucial step in the struggle to realize the American dream of liberty and equality for all. In Daybreak of Freedom, Stewart Burns presents a groundbreaking documentary history of the boycott. Using an extraordinary array of more than one hundred original documents, he crafts a compelling and comprehensive account of this celebrated year-long protest of racial segregation. Daybreak of Freedom reverberates with the voices of those closest to the bus boycott, ranging from King and his inner circle, to Jo Ann Robinson and other women leaders who started the protest, to the maids, cooks, and other 'foot soldiers' who carried out the struggle. With a deft narrative hand and editorial touch, Burns weaves their testimony into a riveting story that shows how events in Montgomery pushed the entire nation to keep faith with its stated principles.

Editorial Reviews

Review

An insightful documentary history of the nation•s most successful nonviolent mass protest.

Register of the Kentucky Historical Society

[A] rich documentary history of a crucial episode during the civil rights movement.

Florida Historical Quarterly

A skillfully edited, handsomely designed volume that will be proven useful to anyone interested in the civil rights movement.

Journal of Southern History

[A] treasure trove of possibilities for any teacher who uses primary sources.

Journal of American History

Provides an intimate yet thorough analysis of a moment in the Civil Rights Movement.

West Coast Review of Books

Product Details

• Paperback: 392 pages
• Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press (October 1, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0807846619
• ISBN-13: 978-0807846612
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,521,868 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A worthwhile read that adds much to the subject, January 17, 2006

By 

Edward Morgan (Mountain View, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Daybreak of Freedom: The Montgomery Bus Boycott (Paperback)

I take issue with the reviewer who criticizes Burns for his scholarship. This work has a clear, succinct purpose: To let the boycott participants on all sides of the issue tell the story themselves. Burns never intended for this work to be definitive, only elucidating, and it is that, and more.

This publication arose out of Burns' work editing the King papers at Stanford, spurred by a suggestion from senior editor Clayborne Carson. Burns masterfully edits and assembles the letters, interviews, transcripts of court actions, newspaper clippings, and other materials, adds just enough gloss for clear understanding, and gets out of the way. It takes skill, judgment, and respect for the sources to strike such a balance, and he gets it just right.

I'll take this approach any day over a tome by some windbag scholar who has digested the sources and wants to tell me what to think about this important, complex, seminal event in American history. Read the materials yourself, and do your own thinking. That's what Burns set out to accomplish, and in my opinion, he's hit the mark admirably. I highly recommend it.

3 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Poor scholarship, July 28, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Daybreak of Freedom: The Montgomery Bus Boycott (Paperback)

This book is another example of "hands-off" scholarship in that it appears as if the editor never visited Montgomery but rather relied on secondary sources. Though there are numerous excerpts, the editor did not perform the necessary research which would have revealed (a) that the Boycott had its roots within the American labor movement and, more specfically, events which happened in Birmingham, Alabama, during the 1930s and (b) there probably still exists in the archives of the Montgomery Improvement Association or in at least one other place financial and other records not taken to the King Center which would have told an in-depth story using primary sources. In summary, in deciding whether to purchase this book---pass!