Children need to know that the struggles and victories of the civil rights movement were only possible through the leadership and participation of everyday people. How can we inspire kids to work for justice today? By telling them about the brave, passionate, and dedicated people of all ages and stations who made the civil rights movement what it was.
In this post, I dive deep into a new children’s book about Tent City in Fayette County, Tennessee. It’s a little known campaign in the civil rights movement where Black sharecroppers showed incredible courage. I also share 16 additional children’s books about civil rights protests, Black civil rights leaders, and their allies.
In this post: (click the subheading title to jump directly to a section).
Evicted! children’s book about Black sharecroppers who pushed the Voting Rights Act forward
Children’s books about Black civil rights leaders
Books about the civil rights movement told from the perspective of children
Civil rights books about white allies
Movement books about the power of protest
Disclosure: For your convenience, this post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase through these links, I may earn a small commission, at no additional cost to you. I was provided a free copy of Stories of the Spirit of Justice from the publisher in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own. You can read my full disclosure policy here.
How Black sharecroppers in rural Tennessee pushed the civil rights movement forward
Their movement sprung up just fifty miles from Memphis, where I’ve lived almost my whole life. Yet I never heard about their story until I was in my late 20s, working as a community organizer. Even then what I learned about the “Tent City” movement was vague.
That’s why I was delighted to learn that celebrated author Alice Faye Duncan had written a children’s book to share this important history of incredible bravery and sacrifice.
Evicted! The Struggle for the Rights to Vote by Alice Faye Duncan and Charly Palmer
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In the acknowledgements to Evicted!, Duncan explains that her journey to writing the book began more than 15 years ago. Famed civil rights photograph Ernest Withers gave her a book of his photography of the Tent City Movement. When she decided years later to begin the writing process, Duncan turned directly to the civil rights movement leaders who participated. Her interviews of people featured in the book add depth and perspective to this little known story.
What inspired the movement that became known as Tent City?
In 1958, Revered Burton Dodson was put on trial and convicted for a murder he did not commit. Farmer John McFerren attended the trial and came to an important realization. Until the Black residents of Fayette County could register to vote, none of them would ever receive a fair trial. Only those who were registered could serve on juries.
McFerren’s newfound enthusiasm for voter registration wasn’t welcomed at first by his wife Viola, who knew the danger they would face.
He was joined by his friend Harpman Jameson, a navy veteran who had risked his life in World War II, yet could not vote in his hometown. His wife Minnie, a teacher, was one of the first to register. The Fayette County School Board promptly fired her. Minnie’s response? “That school board can take my job, but they cannot take my self-respect.”
Tent City is founded
The greatest risk in registering was for the county’s sharecroppers, who lived in shacks provided by the farmers they worked for. As they registered, they lost not just their jobs, but their homes as well.
Shephard Towles, one of the few Black landowners in the county, convinced an anonymous white merchant to donate surplus army tents, Towles pitched on his own land. Not only did the families who moved in face bitter cold, they were also targets for white terrorists who shot at their community.
Meanwhile, a federal lawsuit was filed. Folk singer Pete Seeger wrote a song about Tent City, which you can listen to in the video below.
Reporters from The New York Post and Ebony magazine came into town to tell the sharecroppers’ stories. One reporter asked John McFerren how he could lead this movement even though he didn’t have a formal education. McFerren told him “ain’t no school for this. We have been trained under pressure.”
Tent City and the Voting Rights Act of 1965
By 1962, federal action forced farmers to stop evicting sharecroppers for registering to vote. Over the next two years, Black and white allies to the local sharecroppers showed up to march, register, and campaign for Black candidates. Their action was an important part of a national campaign for voting rights that led to the 1965 Voting Rights Act.
My thoughts on Evicted!
Evicted! is a painstakingly researched account of how ordinary people with little formal education made history. Too many children’s books about the civil rights movement focus mainly on well-known leaders, ignoring the talents and courage of folks on the ground.
Throughout the book, John McFerren’s nephew, James Jr., gives readers insight into how one child experienced these events. Duncan doesn’t give the book a fairytale ending. Instead, we see how John Junior was shaped by the courage of those around him to stand up for what’s right despite persecution. Duncan’s epilogue makes crucial connections to how the struggle for voting rights continues today.
Parker’s acrylic paintings capture both the pain and courage of those who risked everything to assert their rights. A painted cast of characters at the beginning of the book is helpful in keeping up with who’s who as the story develops. There are also a number of moving photos that will help children understand the real people and events that took place.
The book is not an easy read, but’s it’s a necessary one. Though Evicted! is a picture book, it’s not for young children. Both because of the length of the text and honest accounts of lynching and violence, I recommend it for ages 10 – 14. Portions of it could also be read to 8 and 9 year olds, perhaps starting with the section “Minnie Joins the Fight” and continuing to the end of the book.
There are also extensive timelines and source material at the end of the book. Educators can use this valuable material to create lessons or research projects for middle schoolers.
You can find a gallery photos of Tent City by photographer Nick Lawrence on his website.
Important note about Evicted! for non-Black parents and educators:
There are a couple times in Evicted! when racial slurs are quoted. I urge you not to repeat these words when you read the book, especially in settings outside your home. Instead, you might say something like, “and then the sheriff deputy used an ugly racist word. It’s in the book because that’s what he actually said. But I’m not going to repeat the word because it’s hurtful to Black people, and it’s a word we shouldn’t use.”
Children’s books about Black civil rights leaders
Stories of the Spirit of Justice by Jemar Tisby.
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There are a number of Black history biography anthologies out there for older children. Stories of the Spirit of Justice stands out to me for several reasons, and I plan to use it in our homeschool U.S. history lessons.
First, this is a focused collection of biographies, while still covering all the major periods of U.S. history. All of the leaders profiled worked in some way for liberation and justice for Black people, though the ways they did this are incredibly varied.
Second, as a historian who studies the intersection of faith and race, Tisby gives youth thoughtful explanations about how the Christian faith was misused to support racist practices, while also inspiring many African-Americans to stand up for their freedom.
Third, Tisby puts the biographies into important historical context (unlike many compilations for youth that simply describe the leader’s life and work.) Each section begins with a short and accessible essay about the important events of that era.
Last, Tisby includes little details about each leader that make the biographies compelling to read, and relatable to youth. (Recommended for ages 10 – 14. Black author.)
A Song for the Unsung: Bayard Rustin, the Man Behind the 1963 March on Washington by Carole Boston Weatherford and Rob Sanders. Illustrated by Byron McCray.
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Bayard Rustin was a key leader in the civil rights movement, working as a strategist, organizer, speech writer for Dr. King, and more. Yet because of prejudice against Queer people, Rustin’s work was often forced into the background.
A Song for the Unsung weaves together the preparations for the 1963 March on Washington with the story of Rustin’s life. He took great risks not only for civil rights, but for peace (including imprisonment) as part of his Quaker faith.
The theme of music is present on every page spread, with suggestions of songs to sing that match the emotions and experiences of each part of the story. The bold collage illustrations give children plenty to explore even on their second or third reading of the book. (Recommended for ages 6 – 10. Black author and White Queer author.)
Boycott Blues: How Rosa Parks Inspired a Nation by Andrea Davis Pinkney and Brian Pinkney
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Kids may have heard of Rosa Parks, who refused to go to the back of a Montgomery bus. But do they know the story of the bus boycott she sparked that lasted for 382 days? This accessible story from the Pinkneys is narrated by a pooch who knows how dog-tired the people became from walking everywhere they had to go for a year.
Ms. Parks is of course discussed, and Dr. King makes an appearance in the story. But the main focus is on the perseverance of Montgomery’s Black community throughout the boycott. (Recommended for ages 4 – 10. Black author.)
Related Post: Children’s books and activities for teaching truthfully about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Preaching to the Chickens: The Story of Young John Lewis by Jabari Asim and E.B. Lewis
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Long before he was a member of Congress, before he was a Freedom Rider, before he spoke at the March on Washington, John Lewis was a little boy who loved his chickens. Young John often shared his theological insights with them. For example, he tells a hen who fought another over her morning meal that “blessed are the peacemakers.”
When the rolling store man offers to trade some of his goods for one of John’s chickens, John convinces his mother to trade something else. He knows the chickens want to stay with him, so John speaks up for them because they can’t speak up for themselves.
It’s often hard for children to imagine that brave, heroic people were once children like them, but this lovely book helps bridge that gap! Since the book doesn’t talk directly about Lewis’ accomplishments as an adult, I made sure to give my 6 year old a brief summary after we read the book. (Recommended for ages 4 – 8. Black author.)
Related post: 12 children’s books about Black scientists and inventors by Black authors
Voice of Freedom: Fannie Lou Hamer by Carole Boston Weatherford and Ekua Holmes
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In my opinion, Fannie Lou Hamer is one of the most inspiring and under-appreciated heroes of the civil rights movement. This book tells her life story in free form verse with stirring collage illustrations.
Hamer grew up in a sharecropping family in Mississippi, where she saw that racism meant the difference between having enough and poverty. When she asks her mother why she isn’t white, so that she could have enough, her mother tells her that being Black is not bad. Her mother soon buys her a Black doll, telling her “if you respect yourself enough, other people will have to respect you.”
As an adult, Hamer was one of the first Black Mississippians to try to register to vote. After she failed the literacy test, she and her husband were evicted from their land and home. Hamer continued her work for voter registration, and became known for the spirituals she led at meetings and marches.
She continued her work even after she was brutally beaten and imprisoned, determined that she was “marching toward the Promised Land.” When her Mississippi Democratic Freedom Party was denied seating at the national Democratic convention, Hamer made sure that the delegation didn’t give in to deals aimed to silence them. (Recommended for ages 8 – 12. Black author.)
Related Post: Best Children’s Books about Black Women Leaders
Books about the civil rights movement told from the perspective of children
Let the Children March by Monica Clark-Robinson and Frank Morrison
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The Birmingham Children’s Crusade in 1963 was one of the biggest student walkouts in American history. This moving picture book is narrated by an unnamed young woman who participated. I love how the art so often focuses on the children and adult’s facial expressions, capturing everything from fear to pride and assurance.
Why would civil rights movement leaders allow children to be in harm’s way? Dr. King and other adults were hesitant to do so, but they also trusted the youth to make their own decisions. As the book makes clear, young people were well aware of the many ways Jim Crow segregation harmed them. (Recommended for ages 6 – 10. White author.)
The Youngest Marcher: The Story of Audrey Faye Hendricks, a Young Civil Rights Activist by Cynthia Levinson and Vanessa Brantley Newton
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This is another story from the Birmingham Children’s Crusade, told from the perspective of nine year old Audrey Faye Hendricks. The real life Audrey was among the thousands of children and youth who marched. She was also the youngest known person to be arrested during the civil rights movement.
Because Audrey’s family was friends with prominent leaders including Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth and Dr. Martin Luther King, children get to see that they were real life people, in addition to being brave leaders. (Recommended for ages 7 – 11. White author.)
Teacher Resource: Teaching for Social Change’s guide to putting the movement back into civil rights teaching
Freedom School, Yes! by Amy Littlesugar and Floyd Cooper
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In the summer of 1964, volunteers set up Freedom Schools throughout Mississippi, designed to teach Black children and adults how to read, and help them register to vote.
Jolie’s mother is the only member of their church brave enough to host a Freedom School teacher. It only takes one day for a brick to be thrown through the family’s window. When Jolie tells her Uncle Shad he wishes her teacher Annie and the Freedom School had never come, he changes her perspective. She’ll learn not just about people and places, but who she is, he promises. And that will keep her from being stopped by fear.
When racists burn down the church that houses the Freedom School, volunteers spring into action to build a new school. Throughout the summer, Jolie learns not just from Annie, but from her community, why they must be brave as they work for change. (Recommended for ages 7 – 10)
Memphis, Martin, and the Mountaintop by Alice Faye Duncan and R. Gregory Christie
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As a resident of Memphis and a former worker rights organizer, I’ve always been inspired by the courageous sanitation workers who walked off the job in 1968. Duncan tells their story and how Dr. King became part of it through moving poems and the narration of young Lorraine. Lorraine’s father is a sanitation worker who faces “starvation pay,” insults, and even deadly working conditions.
This detailed picture book for older children covers all the important events of the strike. The moment Lorraine’s father walks off the job with his 1,300 co-workers. Mayor Loeb’s attempt to intimidate the strikers with armed tanks. Dr. King’s tragic assassination, and the sanitation workers’ eventual victory. (Recommended for ages 8 – 12. Black author.)
Related Post: 13 Children’s Books about Worker Rights
These Hands by Margaret H. Mason and Floyd Cooper
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This simple, loving story of a grandfather and grandson tells the many things Grandpa’s hands can do. They can teach little Joseph to tie his shoes, and they can make the piano keys “sing like a sparrow in springtime.” But, Grandpa says, there was a time when his hands weren’t allowed to make bread at the Wonder Bread factory.
The bosses said white people wouldn’t want to eat bread that Black hands had touched. So Joseph’s grandpa and many others who were relegated to cleanup jobs in the factory organized. Because of Grandpa’s courage, Joseph’s hands can now do “anything at all in this whole wide world.” (Recommended for ages 4 – 8)
Ruby Bridges Goes to School: My True Story by Ruby Bridges
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My son had the great privilege of receiving this book directly from Ruby Bridges herself at the annual reading festival she leads at Memphis’ National Civil Rights Museum. Written for early readers and illustrated with photographs, the simple book tells how Ruby desegregated the William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans all by herself.
For months, Ruby entered the school each day to learn with just her teacher, as white parents kept their children home (and some gathered in mobs outside the school.) (Recommended for ages 4 – 6. Black author. Bridges also tells her story in the more detailed picture book Through My Eyes. )
Related Post: 5 kid activists from American history
Freedom Summer by Deborah Wiles and Jerome Lagarrigue
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When the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 passed, that meant that Southern states could no longer bar Black people from public facilities as they had in the past. In some places, determined to keep segregation alive, white leaders closed public facilities like swimming pools rather than having to integrate them.
Joe, who is white, is best friends with John Henry, who is Black. There are many things they can’t do together that best friends would normally do. When Joe hears that everyone is going to be allowed to use the town pool, he and John Henry rush there to swim together for the first time. But they find workers pouring tar into the pool.
John Henry knows exactly what this is happening: “white folks don’t want colored folks in their pool.” Joe tries to say that it doesn’t matter; they can just go swim in the creek. But John Henry makes it clear that it does matter, very much, that he can’t do the same things that Joe can. (Recommended for ages 5 – 9)
Malcolm Little: The Boy Who Grew Up to Become Malcolm X by Ilyasah Shabazz and A.G. Ford
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How do great leaders for freedom become the people they are? From this beautiful tribute by Malcolm X’s daughter Ilyasah Shabazz, we learn how Malcolm’s childhood shaped him. The strong influence of his parents, who supported freedom for Black people through the Marcus Garvey movement, molded him. So did experiences of white racism, including the burning of the Littles’ home when Malcolm was just four years old. But we also see that Malcolm was a “fun loving prankster,” as well as a young leader who always asked many questions. (Recommended for ages 8 – 12. Black author.)
Related Post: 15 books to help kids and teens understand that Black Lives Matter
One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia
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Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern have been raised by their father and grandmother in New York ever since their mother Cecile left them. But in the summer of 1968, Papa decides its times for them to get to know their mother. The girls fly out to Oakland, hoping to finally experience all the things a mother is supposed to provide.
But Cecile makes no secret of the fact that she didn’t want the girls to visit. When they ask for breakfast, she tells them to go down to the Black Panther Party’s summer camp. The girls are used to their southern grandmother’s efforts to make them act “respectable” in public, so at first much of what they learn from the Black Panthers is jarring. Gradually though, the messages of self respect and power for the people shape the girls’ understanding of who they are, and who their mother is. (Recommended for ages 8 – 12. Black author.)
Related Post: 12 engaging chapter books to read for Black History Month
Civil rights movement children’s books about white allies
She Stood for Freedom: The Untold Story of a Civil Rights Hero: Joan Trumpauer Mulholland by Loki Mulholland, Angela Fairwell, and Charlotta Janssen
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As a white child growing up in the South, Joan Trumpauer Mulholland realized Black people weren’t treated as equal to white people. She promised herself she would do something about that. She joined the civil rights movement while in college, and quickly had to leave segregated Duke University because of it.
Joan knew that many of her family members might cut her out of their lives because of her activism, but she joined the lunch counter sit-ins anyway. Even after Joan was sent to the notorious Parchman Prison for participating in the Freedom Rides, she continued to speak up and take action. Because her activism spanned so many important events of the civil rights movement, this book is a great introduction to its history for older elementary children. (Recommended for ages 8 – 12)
Related Post: Talking to kids about antiracist allies and accomplices
Civil rights movement books about the power of protest
We March by Shane W. Evans
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This simple and moving picture book is ideal for introducing the youngest readers to the March on Washington. Readers follow one family as they rise at daybreak to prepare for the march. First they gather at the church, where they pray and make signs. Then they join thousands who pour out of buses from across the country.
I love that when the march begins, participants are holding signs that are identical to the real ones you’ll see in photographs from the March on Washington. The pictures and text alike help children see the power of community in the struggle for justice. (Recommended for ages 3 – 7. Black author.)
Related Post: 8 ways to teach kids about democracy and citizenship (includes book list)
Freedom on the Menu: The Greensboro Sit-Ins by Carole Boston Weatherford and Jerome Lagarrigue
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What did the sacrifices that ordinary people made during the civil rights movement look like through a child’s eyes? Eight year old Connie hears from her parents and siblings that things are starting to change. She tags along with her older brother and sister as they volunteer for the NAACP, registering people to vote. She’s excited when she sees friends of her brother sitting at the Woolworth’s lunch counter, trying to be served.
But when Connie’s sister is arrested for protesting, and refuses her father’s attempt to bail her out of jail, Connie wants her sister to stop her activism. She of course refuses. The whole family has to make changes to support the movement, like shopping from the Sears catalog instead of going to the downtown stores. When Connie asks how long they’ll be doing this, her mother tells her “til folks get what they want.” (Recommended for ages 6 – 10. Black author.)
Related Post: 15 picture books about social justice and human rights
