Lesa Cline-Ransome
Author
Series
Finding Langston trilogy volume 1
Summary
Discovering a book of Langston Hughes' poetry in the library helps Langston cope with the loss of his mother, relocating from Alabama to Chicago as part of the Great Migration, and being bullied.
4) Being Clem
Author
Series
Finding Langston trilogy volume 3
Formats
Summary
When nine-year-old Clem's father dies in the Port Chicago Disaster he is forced to navigate his family's losses and struggles in 1940's Chicago.
1944. Clem's father is away, serving as a sailor in World War II. When the family receives news that his father has died in the infamous Port Chicago explosion in San Francisco, everything begins to fall apart. Clem's mother is forced to work long, tough hours as a maid for a wealthy white family. The obstacles...
5) For Lamb
Author
Summary
"An interracial friendship between two teenaged girls goes tragically wrong in this powerful historical novel set in the Jim Crow South. For Lamb follows a family striving to better their lives in the late 1930s Jackson, Mississippi. Lamb's mother is a hard-working, creative seamstress who cannot reveal she is a lesbian. Lamb's brother has a brilliant mind and has even earned a college scholarship for a black college up north--if only he could curb...
Author
Series
Finding Langston trilogy volume 2
Summary
Raised by his grandparents, first in Mississippi then in Wisconsin, ten-year-old Lymon moves to Chicago in 1945 to live with the mother he never knew, while yearning for his father.
10) Benny Goodman & Teddy Wilson: taking the stage as the first black and white jazz band in history
Author
Summary
Celebrates the first widely seen integrated jazz performance: the debut of the Benny Goodman quartet with Teddy Wilson in 1936 Chicago.
13) Claudette Colvin
Author
Series
Summary
"Before Rosa Parks famously refused to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, fifteen-year-old Claudette Colvin made the same choice. She insisted on standing up--or in her case, sitting down--for what was right, and in doing so, fought for equality, fairness, and justice." -- Amazon.com.
Author
Summary
Ethel L. Payne always had an ear for stories. Seeking truth, justice, and equality, Ethel followed stories from her school newspaper in Chicago to Japan during World War II. It even led her to the White House briefing room, where she broke barriers as one of the first black journalists. Ethel wasn't afraid to ask the tough questions of presidents, elected officials, or any one else in charge, earning her the title "First Lady of the Black Press."...
15) One big open sky
Author
Summary
"In the 1870s, a Black family undertakes a perilous wagon journey westward for a tenuous shot at freedom in Nebraska"--
Summary
At one point, the word "computer" referred to the people who used their knowledge, pencils, adding machines and paper to calculate complex equations needed for space travel. As one of these mathematicians at NACA's Langley laboratory, Katherine Johnson's skills were in high demand and she was trusted by administrators and astronauts alike to be accurate and reliable.