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83 of 86 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An Important Document, January 27, 2005
This review is from: Dear Senator: A Memoir by the Daughter of Strom Thurmond (Hardcover)
As a Black South Carolinian myself, I would certainly love to sit down and chat with Mrs. Washington-Williams after reading this.
Anyone who was born out of wedlock, adopted, and had an ambiguous or contentious relationship with their biological father, as was the case with myself, can truly say A-MEN and indentify with the pain she describes of not being openly acknowledged by one's biological father. She does an excellent job of articulating what it's like to be in that situation and people who could identify with this will find this aspect of the book almost theraputic.
The book is great with South Carolina history. She does a good job of detailing South Carolina's dark and racist past, and it's amazing to know that her bloodline contains some of the most infamous enemies to Black people that SC has ever known (Matthew C. Butler who led a masacre of 40 Blacks in Hamburg SC in 1876, William Thurmond, Strom's dad, who masterminded the career of the pro-lynching Senator Ben Tillman who also disfranchised and Jim-crowed Blacks in SC, etc. etc.). Strom Thurmond was Abraham Lincoln compared to these guys, and Mrs. Washington-Williams makes no apologies for these characters.
Having met Strom once in 1991 myself, I can attest to what she says about Strom Thurmond's two-sidedness in his relationship with African-Americans. An uncle of mine worked for him, and even Blacks who (rightfully) detested him as I did found him strangely likeable and charming in person. But while she finds it difficult to express her ambivalence about their relationship and his refusal to publicly acknowledge her in spite fo his personal kindness, she learns not to hold back on her disgust of his public statements and policies toward African-Americans. He seemed genuinely shocked to hear his daughter say "Black people HATE you, Senator!" as if he was not accustomed to having blacks speak to him with such frankness.
There is one moment that I had to question in this book. As a South Carolina historian, I read with amusement as she described seeing the Confederate Flag flying above the State House in Columbia in 1941. Fack is folks, that flag was not put up there until 1962. But that's a minor detail.
In either case, the concluding chapter in which she sums up her views about her heritage and race relations will sound like anathema to some and will be cheered by others. Even if you disagree with her on some points, she clearly explains in her story how she come to such conclusions.
So for an important document on a seldom-discussed aspect of some of the most hypocritical factors of the Jim Crow era and as an articulation of the pain that could be caused by out of wedlock births to fathers whose emotional support is lacking, I speak with pride of Mrs. Washington Williams as my fellow South Carolinian, fellow American, and fellow human being.
If she's ever in Charleston, I'll be sure to get my copy autographed.
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21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A heritage finally exposed and acknowledged..., October 29, 2005
This review is from: Dear Senator: A Memoir by the Daughter of Strom Thurmond (Hardcover)
Dear Senator is an amazing book written with candour, honesty, humour and sadness by the biracial daughter of the racist Senator Strom Thurmond who died in 2003.
I read the book from cover to cover on the day that it arrived through the post; sadly it is not a book you can get easily here in the UK.
Essie Mae Washington-Williams grew up in a segregated world that was the USA in the 1920s, until one day she found out that her Mother was actually her Aunt and her mother's sister Carrie Butler her real mother!
Another shock followed this revelation in 1938, Essie Mae had taken it for granted she had a Black father but it turned out that her father was actually a white man, not only was he white but he came from a rich and powerful white Southern family and he had been secretly supporting his once black mistress and their daughter.
Strom Thurmond was a man known and still known for his racist ideals, based on what he wrongly thought was best for black and white and idea for a perfect America did not include racial mixing, however he did not practice what he preached and his daughter Essie was living proof of his double standards.
This book could have been an angry, bitter book by a woman who had lived in the shadows for all of her 70 or so years, denying what she knew as the truth that she was in fact Strom Thurmond's first born child, never able to stand publicly at her father's side because of who he was and what he stood for.
Essie Mae, however avoids such anger, platitudes and resentment though she pulls no punches as she takes us page by page through her life, growing up not in poverty but neither in wealth, getting a good high school education and eventually becoming a teach and Strom did financially provide for his daughter over the years, and even subsequently helped her children though he never called them "his grandchildren" which hurt Essie Mae immensely.
Essie Mae's first husband Julius hated Strom Thurmond so much she didn't dare tell him at first who her real father was, the irony was that most people at the college she attended knew that Strom's biracial daughter was somewhere on campus but no one knew who she was and there was much speculation but luckily for Essie Mae no one connected her to Strom but eventually Essie had to tell her husband the truth and his shock at this revelation is almost funny in a tragic-comic way.
This is a book that smashes to pieces the theory that racial segregation worked even in a time of Jim Crow and lynchings, and that a kind of love could exist between two people from two different worlds.
With the death of her father in 2003 Essie Mae finally did what she could not do in his lifetime, she set the record straight and told the world who she was and who her father was and to give them credit the Strom's white family acknowledged her claim, accepting her as Strom Thurmond's daughter.
An insightful read which is powerful and evocative and Essie Mae shows herself to be far more forgiving than most other people would be, accepting her father's shortcomings whilst never agreeing with his policies and ideals but most poignantly of all she proves herself to be a good and loyal daughter, something that Strom Thurmond did not deserve in my opinion.
Essie Mae was and is Strom Thurmond's truest child out of all the children he fathered (the rest being by his two white wives) and he is the person who ultimately lost out, for she was everything he was not and never could be. A human being with a loving and forgiving heart...
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14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A story of courage, perseverance and grace..., August 19, 2006
Dear Senator: A Memoir of the Daughter of Strom Thurmond by Essie Mae Washington-Williams (written along with William Stadiem) is the autobiography of Strom Thurmond's illegitimate, biracial daughter. This is an amazing story by Washington of learning to accept and love her father and the legacy of her birth.
Washington grew up in Coatesville, PA living a fairly normal childhood until she was 16. At this time, three bombshells would change her life forever. First, she discovered that the couple she assumed to be her parents were actually an aunt and uncle. Second, when traveling to SC for the first time for a family funeral, she was exposed to the ugly face of segregation and the abject poverty in which her southern family lived. But the biggest shock was learning that her father was the prominent white lawyer and judge, Strom Thurmond. Her mother was a 16 year old housemaid in the Thurmond household when Washington was born. After meeting her father for the first time, Thurmond always seemed glad to see Washington, took an interest in her life (especially her education), and always provided her with financial assistance. They met on average once a year. But he never truly acknowledged her as his child--at least not publicly.
Dear Senator is also a window of an ugly period of our history--one that included segregation, racism and Jim Crow. It was especially difficult for Washington when Thurmond went from being a Roosevelt progressive to a Dixiecrat, running for president on a ticket that encouraged segregation and discouraged civil rights initiatives. Although he lost the race, this legacy would brand Thurmond as a racist for the rest of his life. When questioned by Washington, she was told "look at the deeds, not at the words." It was difficult to look past the words when they were filled with such vitriol.
Washington and Thurmond developed a friendly but formal relationship. It would have been so easy for her to go public with her story, especially during Thurmond's Dixiecrat years. But she had no desire to hurt her father. I think she hoped that given time, he would eventually acknowledge her existence (something he never was able to do). It wasn't until after his death that her children encouraged her to come forward. Thurmond's white children have admitted that Washington is their kin, and she has since developed relationships with some of the Thurmond's (including her father's second wife). Although she has yet to see anything from his estate, it did bring her satisfaction to have her name added to the list of his white children on his statue in front of the Capital building in Columbia, SC.
Two things would have enhanced Dear Senator. I would have liked to see pictures of her mother, aunt and uncle. Also, she dedicates the book to the memory of several relatives including her brother and cousin. They are characters in Dear Senator, but she never explains what happens to them. Still, Washington's story is one of courage, perseverance and grace. It's too bad that Thurmond couldn't get past his southern upbringing to publicly accept his oldest daughter. Not only did she accomplish more than her white siblings, but she proved to possess qualities much more important than race, money, and intelligence in that she showed true compassion, loyalty and forgiveness. Her father should have been very proud.
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