Waters Troubled: The Life of Ida B. Book Review

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Waters Troubled: The Life of Ida B. Wells by Linda O. McMurry. Specifically it will contain a critical review of the book. Ida B. Wells was a black activist who came of age after the Civil War in the American South. She was influential, perhaps one of the most influential black women in American history. The author wanted to portray her history so people would have a greater understanding of what she did and who she was, and she did that admirably. She included great detail as to how Wells accomplished her goals and brought attention to many occurrences in the South, but she also focused on many items of Wells life that really had nothing to do with her many accomplishments.

The ultimate goal of Ida Wells' activist work was to bring attention to the practice of lynching of blacks in the South. Wells was orphaned at the age of sixteen when both her parents died in a yellow fever epidemic. She took care of her brothers and sisters as the head of the family after that, finding work as a schoolteacher. The author writes, "Moving into adulthood is often painful and difficult. Wells had to accomplish the passage rapidly and without the aid of her mother or father, who had provided her with a sheltered existence until their early deaths" (McMurry 1998, 50). The author shows how Wells young life affected her growth and activism, and how she came to understand herself and what she believed in, weaving diary entries and early newspaper columns into the journalist she would become.

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In 1891, Wells wrote a column for her newspaper that was critical of her Memphis school board, and they failed to renew her teaching contract. She became the editor of the newspaper she partially owned, which began her full-time career in journalism. She had never liked teaching, so this really started out the career of her dreams, and sent her down the right path in her life. The author continues, "Freedom from teaching allowed Wells to become more deeply involved in various organizational efforts that predated her becoming a fulltime editor. Her roles in the Southern Afro-American Press Association and the National Afro-American League expanded her impact as a racial advocate" (McMurry 1998, 119). This is where Wells' life really begins to change, and she begins to become a real advocate for social change and reform. The author's real purpose becomes clear here, as well. McMurry now shows the fundamental purpose of her portrayal of Wells by showing her as a devoted activist and reformer who begins to show the horrors of lynching and black suppression in the South.

Three of Wells close friends were lynched by a mob of white men after they defended their grocery store by a mob of white men, killing a white deputy in the process. When Wells spoke out against the lynchings, whites drove her newspaper out of business, and she moved north to New York City, where she continued to speak out against lynchings and other practices in the South. Wells wrote of the….....

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