Showing results by publisher "InAudio" in State & Local

In 1892, investigative journalist Ida B. Wells-Barnett published a pamphlet with unflinching and honest descriptions of the cruelties being enacted against Black Americans in the South by their White neighbors. Wells’ poignant and raw reporting of the horrors of lynching scandalized many of her readers outside the South, yet the practice continued unimpeded for more than half a century after. Today, Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases is a sobering reminder that American racism and inequality did not simply end with emancipation.

After losing her husband, Elinore Pruitt washed clothes in Denver to support herself and her daughter. In 1909, she took a job working for a rancher near Burnt Fork, Wyoming. Subsequently she filed her own claim and married the rancher. The letters she wrote to her former employer over several years are packed with delightful stories and fascinating observations about her new life.

“Take the backroads, not the highways,” Minnie Pearl often said—a sentiment that captures her life’s winding journey. Born Sarah Ophelia Colley in 1912, she grew up in Centerville, Tennessee. This small-town upbringing inspired her imagined hometown of Grinder’s Switch. Minnie Pearl’s break came in 1940 when she debuted on the Grand Ole Opry, which marked the beginning of a career that spanned more than fifty years. Garth Brooks remarked, “When she walked out, everybody waited for the ‘How-dee!’ It’s just two syllables, one word, but every time she said it—it felt like it was just for you.”