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From Selma to Sorrow: The Life and Death of Viola Liuzzo

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Only one of the many people who gave their lives for racial justice in the 1960s was a white woman. Several reasons for this become clear in Mary Stanton's moving portrait of the life of Viola Liuzzo.

In an age when conformity was considered a virtue, especially for white women, Viola Liuzzo was not a conformist. A spirited woman who married the first time as a teenager, Liuzzo was at the time of her death attending Wayne State and the mother of five children. Her best friend was African American, when that was considered peculiar. Her husband was a Teamster, but he could not control her. When none of the other students who agreed to accompany Liuzzo to Alabama at Martin Luther King's invitation showed up, she went alone. The March from Selma to Montgomery was hours finished when she and a young black male passenger in her car were shot. He survived, just barely. She did not.

For all Liuzzo's unconventionality, nothing prepared her friends and family for the drubbing her reputation was given by the government. Overnight, she went from a brave, unselfish freedom fighter to a slut who abandoned her children, possibly used drugs and was married to the mob. The information leaked to the press was the invention of the FBI's J. Edgar Hoover. Hoover had his own reputation to protect, and that of an informant inside the Ku Klux Klan, who contributed to Liuzzo's death.

Stanton, who has since written several portraits of whites caught up in the Movement , shows that it was these slurs on Liuzzo's reputation, rather than her death, that inflicted the deepest wounds on her family. She was killed twice-once by a bullet and again by the ugliest kind of slander.

While Congress debates whether or not the Voting Rights Act should be renewed, this book reminds us that our government of, by and for the people has often colluded with the worst among us to keep down the weakest. It's worth remembering.

This book took priority over my agenda, a page turner of the first order. Getting the real story of Viola Liuzzo was on the back burner of my own mind so long I didn't remember it was there until Stanton's book caught my attention at the library. The book is in layers, with the story of getting the story as telling of the 1990s as the unfolding of what was actually happening in Selma and America in the 1960s. The role of women and political correctness 1960s style all over the U.S.A. as well as in Selma rings true. The story of the civil rights movement in the context of the South is absolutely girpping.

Like the author I was stunned in 1965 when I heard of the Liuzzo murder and the trial of Collie Leroy Wilkins. The prologue in Stanton's book was engaging and beautifully written. However, after the prologue the book is not as compelling. Ms. Stanton clearly suggests that Rowe was the murderer, but leaves some large questions unanswered. Where is Leroy Moton? If Moton testified that Wilkins was the murderer why dismiss Moton's testimony because of lie detector tests administered to Wilkins? I wonder if Rowe committed the crime myself, but I don't see evidence in the book to support the author's perspective. Even if Rowe did commit the murder, that does not exonerate Wilkins or Murphy. Also, the book seemed unevenly documented. In some cases there were footnotes from newspapers that were either unnecessary or provided insufficient support. In other cases claims were made without any documentation.

What is good about this book is Ms. Stanton's passion. What it lacks is structure and support for some of the claims contained therein. Still, I am glad I read the book and glad she wrote it.

Like Mary Stanton, I was also curious about Mrs Luizzo, and she stayed in the back of my mind. I am sorry for the loss her family and many other families suffered simply because they wanted to change something that was completely wrong and unjust. I also feel shame on a government who would go so far to make those who were right and decent appear so degrading and immoral and to even allow murder to protect the "status quo" This book is must reading for anyone who really wants to take the blinders off about what really happened during that horrible time. I have recently been given the opportunity to visit parts of Alabama and while the area I visited is very decent, mentally I can still visualize the Alabama of 1965 and understand why it is necessary to leave the Viola Luizzo marker defaced; as the author has stated the struggle isn't over. Thank you Mary Stanton

I remember the murder of Viola Liuzzo very well because her son Tommy was in my class at Precious Blood School in Detroit when it happened. We were in 8th grade. I remember the aftermath, although being only 13, I was only marginally aware of the magnitude of the whole event. My mother was one, of many, who asked "what was she doing there when she had 5 kids in Detroit?" Reading Mary Stanton's book took me back to a difficult place and time. She has done her research well and cares about her subject. It was painful reading for me because of what happened to the family and in my furvent hope that I was not one of Tommy's grade school tormentors. A wonderful depiction of a fascinating person and a terrible time in our country's history.

Truly outstanding story-within-a-story. Stanton takes you through her own journeys as she parses Liuzzo's history. It's great to see Liuzzo vindicated, and this book provides a mirror to that particular point in time.

The only thing I remember in 1965 about my childhood in Montgomery, Alabama was that I was six-years-old and there was the terrible murder of a white woman by the Ku Klux Klan. I didn't know her name. All I knew was she was killed for having a black man ride in her car with her. That is all I have known for years. Thanks to Mary Stanton's excellent biography, I now know her name and her story. One night after reading several chapters I could not get to sleep. My thoughts were of Vi and Highway 80 out of Selma. Remembering can be a painful thing but through the sensitivity of Stanton's writing and her personal admiration for Viola Liuzza, I came to love and admire this courageous woman. Sorry that we never met. I appreciate Stanton sharing her struggle to research the story and write it. That was fascinating and very rewarding to be at Stanton's side page after page hoping her contacts and leads would pan out.

The story of the Detroit houswife, Viola Liuzzo, who left her husband and five children to go off to Selma is lodged in the psyche somewhere of most people alive in those civil rights days of 1965. She answered the call of Martin Luther King Jr. to come to Selma and march for the voting rights of the South's oppressed Blacks. About 25,000 persons answered that call. Only two did not come back, James Reeb and Viola Liuzzo. She was in Selma about a week working effectively. She was in Montgomery as the march ended with 50,00 strong singing "black and white together, we shall overcome" at the State Capitol while George Wallace peeked out his office window. She got killed in the swamp of "Bloody Lowndes" on Highway 80 on the way back to Selma that March 25, 1965. She was killed by Klansmen of Birmingham's Eastview Klavern 13 who drove up beside her car and fired point blank. The story of why she came to Selma is fascinating. The story of how racism and sexism interacted to destroy her is sad. This is Mary Stanton's story of the "double murder" of Viola Liuzzo. First her body was killed on Highway 80 then J.Edgar Hoover, thoughtless journalists and lawyers murdered her reputation.If you are interested in civil rights, feminisn, justice or the story of a strong woman and her family this is a book for you. As I write this 35,000 people have bought this book. They were all right to do so and you will be too. Mary Stanton is attracted to the Viola Liuzzo and the story of her family before and since her death. This makes for a great book.--W. Edward Harris

What a great book! The reader gets a great feel for civil rights history, and a fascinating perspective on life for a housewife in the mid-sixties. The book provides a clear understanding of the prevailing feelings and attitudes about racism and sexism in both the Northern and Southern United States for the civil rights period of history. I highly recommend the book.

Very interesting. I found out about this story after listening to and enquiring into the song "Viola" by Robin Rogers.