In June of 1957, Governor James Coleman stepped before the cameras on NBC’s “Meet the Press” and was asked whether the public schools would ever be integrated. “Well, ever is a long time,” he replied, “[but] I would say that a baby born in Mississippi today will never live long enough to see an integrated school.” In this extraordinary pilgrimage, W. Ralph Eubanks recaptures the feel of growing up during this tumultuous era, deep in rural Mississippi.

Inspired by the 1998 declassification of files kept by the State Sovereignty Commission–an agency specifically created to maintain white supremacy–Ralph Eubanks embarks on an extraordinary pilgrimage to recapture the feel of growing up deep in rural Mississippi. Eubanks vividly evokes a time and place where even small steps across the Jim Crow line became a matter of life and death, he offers eloquent testimony to a family’s grace against all odds. The result is a journey of discovery that leads Eubanks not only to surprising conclusions about his own family, but also to harrowing encounters with those involved in some of the era’s darkest activities.