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Outside the Magic Circle: The Autobiography of Virginia Foster Durr

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For one who is interested in history, history of the Civil Rights Movement, especially in the state of Alabama this is a must read.

As she tells about her mother and father and of growing up in Alabama in the days of black workers in the home,she introduces someone that is not familiar with the south and the times to what that was like.

Viginia and her husband Clifford Durr, an attorney lived in Montgomery during the time that Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on the bus. When they befriended Rosa their life was forever changed.

Outside the Magic Circle gives the background on the life of Virginia Durr, and how she, a conventional southern belle ended up as a prominent Civil Rights activist. Mrs. Durr talks about how she began to question the ideas of white supremacy and Southern Traditions that she was brought up with. She mentions her brother in law Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black and other Washington politicos such as Harold Ickes, and Eleanor Roosevelt that she met over the years.

She tells of how redbaiting damaged the fight for civil rights and how the red scare which started under Truman and helped to create McCarthy paralyzed America.

Although Mrs. Durr was happy about the abolition of segregation, she knew that integration didn't solve all of America's problems and that America is still divided by race and class.