This Little Light of Mine: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer

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University Press of Kentucky, Aug 24, 2007 - Biography & Autobiography - 390 pages
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" WITH A FOREWORD BY MARION WRIGHT EDELMAN The award-winning biography of black civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer. ""Riveting. Provides a history that helps us to understand the choices made by so many black men and women of Hamer's generation, who somehow found the courage to join a movement in which they risked everything."" --New York Times Book Review ""One is forced to pause and consider that this black daughter of the Old South might have been braver than King and Malcolm."" --Washington Post Book World ""An epic that nurtures us as we confront today's challenges and helps us Keep Hope Alive.'"" --Jesse L. Jackson ""Not only does This Little Light of Mine recount a vital part of America""s history, but it lights our future as readers are inspired anew by Mrs. Hamer's spirit, courage, and commitment."" --Marian Wright Edelman ""This book is the essence of raw courage. It must be read."" --Rep. John Lewis

 

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LibraryThing Review

User Review  - froxgirl - LibraryThing

Why does this 1993 biography seem so much stronger and more straight forward than what I am reading now? I know there's much more introspection and navel gazing these days, especially in memoirs. Here ... Read full review

THIS LITTLE LIGHT OF MINE: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer

User Review  - Kirkus

From former Los Angeles Times editorial writer Mills (A Place in the News, 1988)—a biography more fulsome than definitive of civil-rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer. The 20th child of dirt-poor black ... Read full review

Selected pages

Contents

Introduction
xxiii
This Little Light of Mine
4
I Been Buked and I Been Scorned
21
I Want My Freedom Now
41
It Isnt Nice to Go to Jail
54
Keep Your Eyes on the Prize Hold On
76
Everybody Knows about Mississippi God Damn
103
Im Going to Sit at the Welcome Table
132
Every Rung Goes Higher Higher
214
Every New One Makes Us Stronger
234
Got My Hand on the Gospel Plow
252
Sisters Brothers All
271
And the Movements Movin On
289
Go Home to My Lord and Be Free
307
Chronology
313
Cast
319

Which Side Are You On?
143
Freedom Is a Constant Struggle
170
This Is a Brand New Day
190
Do What the Spirit Says Do
201
Notes
326
Acknowledgments
372
Index
376
Copyright

Other editions - View all

This Little Light of Mine: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer
Kay Mills
Snippet view - 1993
This Little Light of Mine: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer
Kay Mills
Snippet view - 1993

Common terms and phrases

Aaron Henry Annie Devine asked attorney black candidates black women Bob Moses called campaign Carter challenge Charles Evers Charles McLaurin church civil rights movement civil rights workers Congress congressional convention cotton court Delta Democratic Party Eastland election Fannie Lou Hamer federal felt Freedom Democratic Party Freedom Farm Freedom Summer going hearing House Indianola interview Jackson jail John Doar Julian Bond Justice Department Kinoy knew leaders lived Loyalists Martin Luther King mayor meeting Missis Mississippi Freedom Democratic NAACP Negro never oral history organizing plantation police political president Rauh recalled register to vote Ruleville seated Senator singing sippi SNCC SNCC files SNCC workers song South Southern Sugarman Sunflower County talk things tion University Victoria Gray Victoria Gray Adams voter registration Voting Rights wanted Washington Winona woman York young

Popular passages

Page 28 - The blacks were forced to hold out their hands while one finger at a time was chopped off. The fingers were distributed as souvenirs. The ears of the murderers were cut off. Holbert was beaten severely, his skull was fractured, and one of his eyes, knocked out with a stick, hung by a shred from the socket.‎
Appears in 49 books from 1890-2007
Page 119 - All of this is on account we want to register, to become first-class citizens, and if the Freedom Democratic Party is not seated now, I question America, is this America, the land of the free and the home of the brave where we have to sleep with our telephones off the hooks because our lives be threatened daily because we want to live as decent human beings, in America?‎
Appears in 57 books from 1988-2008
Page 328 - Paula Giddings, When and Where I Enter: The Impact of Black Women on Race and Sex in America (New York: William Morrow, 1984...‎
Appears in 214 books from 1985-2008
Page 142 - You don't have to be a man to fight for freedom. All you have to do is be an intelligent human being. And automatically, your intelligence makes you want freedom so badly that you'll do anything, by any means necessary, to get that freedom.‎
Appears in 10 books from 1965-2007
Page 72 - Whoever, under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom, willfully subjects any inhabitant of any State, Territory, or District to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States...‎
Appears in 429 books from 1798-2008
Page 118 - We are going to make you wish you was dead." I was carried out of that cell into another cell where they had two Negro prisoners. The State Highway Patrolmen ordered the first Negro to take the blackjack. The first Negro prisoner ordered me, by orders from the State Highway Patrolman for me, to lay down on a bunk bed on my face, and I laid on my face. The first Negro began to beat, and I was beat...‎
Appears in 23 books from 1962-2007
Page 34 - They got out of the car and went up the walk to the courthouse as if this was the long walk that [led] to the Golden Gates of Heaven, their heads held high.‎
Appears in 16 books from 1943-2007
Page 140 - I might say, secondly, some people wonder, well, what has Mississippi got to do with Harlem? It isn't actually Mississippi; it's America. America is Mississippi. There's no such thing as a Mason-Dixon Line — it's America. There's no such thing as the South — it's America. If one room in your house is dirty, you've got a dirty house.‎
Appears in 9 books from 1965-2007
Page 63 - Whoso diggeth a pit shall fall therein : and he that rolleth a stone, it will return upon him.‎
Appears in 259 books from 1804-2008
Page 117 - County, the home of Senator James O. Eastland, and Senator Stennis. It was the 31st of August in 1962 that eighteen of us traveled twenty-six miles to the county courthouse in Indianola to try to register to try to become first-class citizens. We was met in Indianola by Mississippi men, highway patrolmens, and they only allowed two of us in to take the literacy test at the time.‎
Appears in 14 books from 1965-2007

References to this book

About the author (2007)

Kay Mills, freelance writer, worked for the Los Angeles Times for 13 years, including a stint on its editorial board. She has a B.A. in political science from Pennsylvania State University and an M.A. in history from Northwestern University. In addition to her work at the Times, Mills worked for Senator Edmund Muskie during the 1970s and for the Newhouse newspaper chain. Kay Mills's books include A Place in the News: From the Women's Pages to the Front Page and This Little Light of Mine: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer, a biography of the civil rights activist from Mississippi.

Bibliographic information

QR code for This Little Light of Mine
TitleThis Little Light of Mine: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer
Civil rights and the struggle for Black equality in the twentieth century
AuthorKay Mills
Editionillustrated, reprint
PublisherUniversity Press of Kentucky, 2007
ISBN0813191823, 9780813191829
Length390 pages
Subjects › 

Biography & Autobiography / Cultural Heritage
Biography & Autobiography / Historical
Biography & Autobiography / Women
  
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