We Had Sneakers, They Had Guns: The Kids Who Fought for Civil Rights in Mississippi

So I want to talk about racism. I want to talk about Mississippi. I want to talk about events I observed that turned into history. I want to talk about black people who didn't know white people and white people who didn't know black people but who shared a season of time, a long, hot summer that some people now think of as mythic. But it wasn't mythic. Myths are populated by people who are bigger than life. I want to talk about people I met a long time ago in Mississippi who were not bigger than life, just more curious than some, more loving than some, more enlightened than some, more vulnerable than some, more lucky than some. I drew their pictures when they were younger and I was younger, and I wrote their stories in Stranger at the Gates more than forty years ago. I still want to talk about them. Those conversations were never finished. Those sketches were sketches, not a finished portrait. For me, Mississippi remains a remarkable work in progress." -from the Prologue

So I want to talk about racism. I want to talk about Mississippi. I want to talk about events I observed that turned into history. I want to talk about black people who didn't know white people and white people who didn't know black people but who shared a season of time, a long, hot summer that some people now think of as mythic. But it wasn't mythic. Myths are populated by people who are bigger than life. I want to talk about people I met a long time ago in Mississippi who were not bigger than life, just more curious than some, more loving than some, more enlightened than some, more vulnerable than some, more lucky than some. I drew their pictures when they were younger and I was younger, and I wrote their stories in Stranger at the Gates more than forty years ago. I still want to talk about them. Those conversations were never finished. Those sketches were sketches, not a finished portrait. For me, Mississippi remains a remarkable work in progress." -from the Prologue

Jim Hahn - Library Journal

Sugarman (Stranger at the Gates: A Summer in Mississippi), a participant in Freedom Summer in Mississippi in 1964-65, where the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) worked for voter registration efforts and community organizing, writes an introspective memoir complete with many of his original illustrations composed that summer. For Sugarman, there are no easy answers to the intricacies shown in movement organizing, state-sanctioned violence, and passionate discourse with the white establishment. This account of Freedom Summer is significant by virtue of the insights into the lives of the youth of the Civil Rights Movement. Many blacks in Mississippi had never worked closely with whites; for students of the North, who had been so isolated from the terror of the South, Freedom Summer represented a fascinating experiment. Many, such as Fannie Lou Hamer, depicted by Sugarman, gave their lives so that all citizens would have the right to vote. This book is a testament to the courageous civil rights workers whose perseverance and courage will inspire all readers.

Tracy Sugarman is a well-known illustrator whose work has appeared in major magazines and books, and on television. He has received numerous awards from the Society of Illustrators in New York and the Art Directors Club in Washington, D.C.