Group Read: Seattle in Black and White

Sustainable Ballard’s DEI Taskforce is excited to share a book that we have recently come across – Seattle in Black and White: The Congress of Racial Equality and the Fight for Equal Opportunity. The 288 page book details the formation and activities of the Seattle chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) in the early 60s.

We’ll discuss the book in the sections laid out in the book:

Session 1: Beginnings – Aug 3, 7:00 – 8:00 pm
Session 2: Employment – Aug 17, 7:00 – 8:00 pm
Session 3: Housing – Sept 7, 7:00 – 8:00 pm
Session 4: Education – Sept 21, 7:00 – 8:00 pm
Session 5: Internal (Keeping it Going) – Oct 5, 7:00 – 8:00 pm

Please RSVP to receive the Zoom link and join us for one of the first 2 sessions to help decide the discussion schedule going forward.

Reviews:

Seattle needs this book. It tells the remarkable story of the activists who pierced the veil of complacency in the early 1960s and forced the city to begin dismantling its systems of segregation.

James N Gregory, author of The Southern Diaspora

..

Four remarkable women helped reshape Seattle in the 1960s. And now they’ve given us a different perspective on the struggle for racial equality than we usually get. . . . Their history is not built around the usual outsized heroes, but the often-forgotten people who made the movement work. . . . I know Seattle better because of their book. It’s a valuable window on CORE’s seven years as a catalyst for change in Seattle.

Seattle Times

You can check out a copy from Seattle Public Library and even request that it be sent to the Ballard Branch. The book is also available for purchase at UW Press.