by Thomas Healy
Warren Industrial Park (formerly A. Philip Randolph Industrial Park)
Warren Manufacturing Company
Warren Record
Warren Regional Planning Corporation
Warrenton, North Carolina
Washington, Booker T.
Washington, D.C.
Washington Evening Star
Washington Post
Watergate affair
Watts (Los Angeles)
Webb, Dorothy
welfare
Welwyn Garden City, England
Wheat Street Baptist Church (Atlanta)
Where Do We Go from Here (King)
White, George
White, William J.
White Circle
White Citizens’ Councils
White City, Kansas
White City Roller Skating Rink
White House Conference on Civil Rights (1966)
White People’s March
whites
Black Power and
CORE and
elections of 1972 and
McKissick’s experience as child and
poverty rates of
Soul City and
Warren county
Whitesboro, Alabama
white supremacy
Whyte, William
Wiley, George
Wilken, Karen
Wilken, Kristina Renee
Wilkins, Roy
Williams, Daisy B.
Williams, George
Williams, Robert F.
“Will v. Reason” (McKissick)
Wilmetco
Wilmington, North Carolina, coup of 1894
Wilson, Woodrow
Winthrop, John
Wise, Bill
Wolfe, Thomas
Wolfe, Tom
Wood, Robert
Woodlands, The, Texas
Woodward, Bob
Woolworth Building, Harlem
Woolworth’s sit-ins
World War II
Worth, Charles
WRAL (radio station)
Wright, Richard
Wright, Stephen J.
Xerox
Yippies
Yom Kippur War
Young, Andrew
Young, Whitney M., Jr.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
In writing this book, I relied heavily on the memory of those who played a part in Soul City’s history and on the archives where the documentary record is stored. I owe a huge debt to both sources.
For sharing their thoughts and recollections with me, I am grateful to Ihsan Abdin, Jane Ball-Groom, Robert Brown, Carlos Campbell, Gordon Carey, Karen Carey, Eva Clayton, T. T. Clayton, Arthur Evans, Danny Gant, Harvey Gantt, David Godschalk, Ferrel Guillory, Magnolia Jackson, Floyd McKissick Jr., Charmaine McKissick-Melton, Beverly McNeill, Lew Myers, Voyette Perkins-Brown, Ruth Perot, Glenn Powell, Pat Stith, Wilfred Ussery, Kristina Vetter, Dorothy Webb, Stu Wechsler, and Linda Worth. Although all these individuals gave generously of their time, I am especially indebted to Jane Ball-Groom, Gordon Carey, and Charmaine McKissick-Melton, each of whom met with me on numerous occasions and answered countless follow-up questions. I also had conversations with many people who were not involved in Soul City but who offered valuable assistance and information, including Monica Berra, Karen Brown, SheRea DelSol, Forest Fesperman, Carla Norwood, Foon Rhee, Gini Richards, and Harold Woodard.
For helping me navigate the documentary record, I am grateful foremost to Maja Basioli, whose expertise and resourcefulness aided me every step of the way. And for making Maja’s help possible—and providing additional support—I am grateful to the entire staff of the Rodino Library at Seton Hall Law School, including Kristina Anderson, Dierdre Freamon, Karlyne Merant, Barbara Mol, Dianne Oster, Brittany Persson, and Elaine Poplaski.
The most important archival resource for Soul City are the Floyd B. McKissick Papers, which are held jointly by the Southern Historical Collection of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the African American Resources Collection of North Carolina Central University. Housed in UNC’s Wilson Library, the McKissick Papers are vast and comprehensive, filling nearly eight thousand folders. Going through these folders reminds one of the incredible amount of work required to organize and maintain a collection like this, and I am grateful to both UNC and NCCU for taking on the task. I am also indebted to the many staff members and administrators at Wilson Library who welcomed me and guided me through the collection, including Sarah Carrier, Bryan Giemza, Tim Hodgdon, and Matthew Turi.
In addition to the Floyd McKissick Papers, I relied upon collections at many other institutions. For help in accessing these collections, I thank the following: Atlanta University Center’s Robert W. Woodruff Library; Margaret Gers at the Enoch Pratt Free Library; Zoe Rhine at the Buncombe County Public Library; Columbia University’s Rare Books and Manuscripts Library; the Columbus Metropolitan Library; Duke University’s David M. Rubinstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library; the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library and Museum; Howard University’s Moorland-Spingarn Research Center; Indiana University’s Archives of African American Music and Culture; the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum; the Library of Congress Manuscript Division; Michigan State University’s G. Robert Vincent Voice Library; Jana L. Hill at Mississippi State University’s Special Collections Department; the National Archives at College Park, Maryland; the New York Public Library’s General Research Division and Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture; the Newark Public Library; the Richard M. Nixon Presidential Library and Museum; the State Library of North Carolina; the North Carolina Legislative Library; Michael Wallace at North Carolina State University’s D. H. Hill Jr. Library; Saundra R. Cropps at the Olivia Raney Local History Library; Mabel Wong at Seton Hall University’s Walsh Library; the Sophia Smith Collection at Smith College; Cheryl B. Martin at the US Army Corps of Engineers Mobile District Library; the US Army Heritage and Education Center; the Center for Legislative Archives at the US National Archives and Records Administration; Deborah Chiarella at University at Buffalo Libraries; Allison Benedetti and Simon Elliot at UCLA’s Charles E. Young Research Library; the Mansfield Library at the University of Montana; the North Carolina Digital Heritage Center; the Vanderbilt Television News Archive; David Spence at the Warren County Memorial Library; and the Wisconsin Historical Society Library.
The writing of this book was supported by a number of grants and fellowships, including a Guggenheim Fellowship; a Public Scholars Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities; a summer research grant from the Documenting Social Change Library Fund at the University of North Carolina; and the Sheila Biddle Ford Foundation Fellowship from the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University. In addition to financial support, the Hutchins Center provided me with an academic home for a semester and the companionship of an amazing group of fellows. For making my semester in Cambridge so memorable and productive, I thank Henry Louis Gates Jr., Krishna Lewis, my co-fellows, and the entire staff of the Hutchins Center. Thanks also to Trevor Morrison and New York University Law School for welcoming me as a visiting scholar and to Kendall Thomas and the Center for the Study of Law and Culture at Columbia Law School for doing the same. The hospitality and intellectual stimulation of both institutions was immensely helpful to me.
In researching this book, I was lucky to have the help of some terrific student assistants. For their hard work and dedication, I thank Ryan Allen, Brenden Carol, Angelica Halat, Seton Hartnett, Elizabeth Kaminski, Levi Klinger-Christiansen, and Lauren McNamara. For supporting me and my research assistants and for taking on the monumental task of organizing the archival documents I collected, I thank Silvia Cardoso, whose good cheer and commitment to excellence make her a pleasure to work with.
Numerous people read all or part of this manuscript. For their generosity and insightful comments, I thank Michelle Adams, Arlene Chow, Carl Coleman, Tristin Green, Tom Hackett, Olatunde Johnson, Krishna Lewis, Solangel Maldonado, and
Najarian Peters. I am also grateful to the many colleagues, friends, and mentors who provided support, encouragement, and advice, including Jake Barnes, Robert Beatty, Vincent Blasi, Kristen Boon, Kathleen Boozang, Kip Cornwell, Michael Dorf, Deborah Edwards, Tim Glynn, Gregg Hecimovich, John Jacobi, Maggie Lewis, Andrea McDowell, Andrew Moore, Todd Richissin, Michael Risinger, Brenda Saunders-Hampden, Brian Sheppard, Cameron Smith, Charles Sullivan, and Richard Winchester. One friend and mentor whose help was especially important, Robert Ferguson, did not live to see this book completed. I was fortunate to have known him and to have had his support.
I am grateful to Seton Hall Law School for providing research funding and a yearlong sabbatical to work on this project, and to workshop participants at Seton Hall, Columbia Law School, the Hutchins Center at Harvard University, Rutgers Law School, and the University of North Carolina.
Thanks to my agent Ryan Harbage for his guidance and enthusiasm and to my editors Grigory Tovbis and Sara Bershtel for once again shepherding me through the editorial process with superb skill and judgment. Thanks also to Molly Pisani for excellent copy editing.
Finally, thanks to my entire family—sisters, brothers, nieces, and nephews—for their love and support, to Adele and Juliet for filling my days with laughter and joy, and most of all to Arlene for sustaining me in so many ways during the course of this project—and long before—with her wit, warmth, and wisdom.
ALSO BY THOMAS HEALY
The Great Dissent: How Oliver Wendell Holmes Changed His Mind—and Changed the History of Free Speech in America
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
THOMAS HEALY is the author of The Great Dissent, which won the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award. He is a professor at Seton Hall Law School and has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the Hutchins Center for African & African American Research at Harvard University. A native of North Carolina, he lives in New York City with his wife and two daughters. You can sign up for email updates here.
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CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Prologue: “Comes the Colored Hour”
PART I
1. “Black Boy in a White Land”
2. Scrambled Egg
3. “Look Out, Whitey!”
4. Dreams into Reality
PART II
5. Klan Country
6. “Integration Blackwards”
7. Green Power
8. A Fresh Start
9. “The Salad Pickers”
10. Naming Rights
11. “Theory of the Sugar Tit”
PART III
12. Black Elephants
13. Present at the Creation
14. Cream of the Crop
15. Blindsided
16. The Battle of Soul City
PART IV
17. Good Place to Live
18. Pride or Prejudice
19. Maseratis and Microwaves
20. “Sorrow’s Kitchen”
Epilogue: Mixed Blessings
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Acknowledgments
Also by Thomas Healy
About the Author
Copyright
SOUL CITY. Copyright ©2021 by Thomas Healy. All rights reserved. For information, address Henry Holt and Co., 120 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10271.
www.henryholt.com
Cover design by Jason Ramirez
Cover house illustration © CSA Images / Getty Images
“Cultural Exchange” from The Panther & the Lash by Langston Hughes, copyright © 1967 by Arna Bontemps and George Houston Bass, Executors of the Estate of Langston Hughes. Used by permission of Harold Ober Associates and Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. All rights reserved.
Lyrics from the song “Little Boxes,” words and music by Malvina Reynolds, copyright © 1962 Schroder Music Co. (ASCAP), renewed 1990. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Lyrics from the song “We Need Nixon,” words and music by Elizabeth Firestone Willis,
published with the permission of Elizabeth Leatherman.
The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:
Names: Healy, Thomas, author.
Title: Soul City: race, equality, and the lost dream of an American utopia / Thomas Healy.
Other titles: Race, equality, and the lost dream of an American utopia
Description: First edition. | New York: Metropolitan Books, Henry Holt and Company, 2021. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020034252 (print) | LCCN 2020034253 (ebook) | ISBN 9781627798624 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781627798617 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Soul City (N.C.)—History. | McKissick, Floyd B. (Floyd Bixler), 1922–1991. | Planned communities—North Carolina—History—20th century. | African Americans—Civil rights—North Carolina—History—20th century. | North Carolina—Race relations—History—20th century. | City planning— United States—History—20th century. | Civil rights worker—North Carolina— Biography. | Warren County (N.C.)—Biography.
Classification: LCC F264.S685 H43 2021 (print) | LCC F264.S685 (ebook) | DDC 975.6/52—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020034252
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020034253
e-ISBN 9781627798617
First Edition 2021
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