The "Red Summer" is a term coined by the Afriican-American historian, James Weldon Johnson, for the year 1919 when hundreds of African-Americans were killed in racist attacks against them and their communities by white supremacist terrorists. In 1919 whites attacked black communities in over three dozen cities across America, including the Appalachian towns of Hancock, West Virginia; Corbin, Kentucky; Knoxville, Tennessee; Hobson City, Alabama, and Raleigh County, West Virginia. This book is the most thorough treatment available of racist violence in Knoxville during the summer of 1919. Robert J. Booker is the former director of the Beck Cultural Exchange Center, a Knoxville Journal columnist, and the author of three books. Arguably the worst aspect of the Presidency of Woodrow Wilson of Staunton, Virginia, was his entry into World War I - a horrible and senseless engagement that was unrelated to American security. Also terrible was his Attorney General, Mitchell Palmer, who led the "Palmer Raids" against "disloyal" labor leaders and opponents of that war. And where should we rank his obdurate racism?
Danbury, Connecticut: Routledge Books, 2001. 105 pages. Trade paperback.