Article archive / December 2022
Originally published: . Volume 13, No. 12. Source pages: 13.
The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson.
Classic recommendations from Decembers past! We asked people what books they’ve read and which ones they would recommend to others to read for education, inspiration, or entertainment.
For this Bookshelf we review some of the best recommendations from 2010–2015 issues. (The credentials may be dated.) Marva L. Lewis, PhD Sociocultural Psychology Associate Professor Tulane University School of Social Work
“One of the most inspirational books I have recently read is The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration, (2011) by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, Isabel Wilkerson. She tells the story of the exodus of almost six million African Americans from the south to northern and western cities from 1915 to 1970. As I read her beautifully written and well-documented narrative I emotionally connected with the human stories she brought to life. I understood for the first time the back-story of my father and mother’s journey from Birmingham, Alabama to Detroit, Michigan in the 1940s. They were eager adolescents in their late teens and early twenties, having left their high school for the ‘warmth of other suns’ of Michigan. Ms. Wilkerson used the stories of several individuals to illustrate the compelling sociological, economic realities that drove people from the south. She helped me understand the untold story of so many of my relatives who journeyed north to the lure of the ‘promise land’ of high paying factory jobs of General Motors. This book described in graphic detail the brutal reality of life the south in the early twenties that propelled the largest urban migration in American history. The life of Blacks in the south included lynching, psychological terrorism, and unremitting racial discrimination. After reading this book I cried. I felt I had heard the poignant stories of my Uncles Charlie, Silas, and Robert, my Aunts Sadie, and Annie Mae; who were the relatives my parents joined as they began their new life filled with the promises of life ‘up north.’”
This article is part of a historical newspaper archive. Read the original issue for its original layout, photographs and graphics.