Mm-hmm.

And so what's interesting about Gloria Richardson, she comes to the movement because her teenage daughters are sitting in and getting arrested.

So she's in her 40s when the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee comes to Cambridge, Maryland, and she soon becomes a leader of people of various ages, of various kind of political orientations, and she's immersing herself in movement.

So in a sense, you know, she cannot be intimidated by the NAACP or King saying, "You should do this, and you shouldn't do that." And she had questions about whether or not nonviolence was really viable in the context of what was happening in Cambridge at the time.

She's really irritated with, um, Robert Kennedy because the Department of Justice is starting to interfere in what's happening in Maryland because it's so close to the White House, and they're concerned of the optics as well as the proximity.

And so in a way, it kind of leverages her independence in this process.

There's nothing for her to be afraid of.

Mm-hmm.

You write about systems and the way that they, they break things down, the way that they, the way that they [laughs] try to hide the things that we can point to.

Everyone is starting from a different place.

But regardless of where they are starting economically, regionally, their kind of social status, racism and sexism will kind of gather them together, right? So whether you are the great Marian Anderson, who has the voice of the century, and you're this incredible opera performer, you will have to sit in a Jim Crow car, right? It doesn't care who you are.

In the same way that someone from an incredibly modest background like Prince Melson Lee, whose husband Herbert Lee was assassinated because of his political work, these are, you were equalized under this really bizarre system, right? And so I think it's in those common experiences that we can see how everyone is trying to navigate it.

Everyone is trying to address it in their own way, but it is a system that is so nefarious and so, so deep in its totality that individual effort will do nothing, right? It's really when there is a collective struggle to fight it where it becomes important.

And I was having a conversation with a journalist who said, "I've always believed in gradualism and moderation," and that's how we understand people like King in the civil rights movement.

And I, I had to say, "But think about this." The way that today some people might think Medicare for All is radical, right? That's a radical idea, or guaranteed basic income or free college.

You had to be, you had to be nimble.

... @KevinPFlynn.

Also, I recently learned on Reddit, thank you, Reddit, that after the age of 45 your body starts to, uh, make some sort of protein or something on your skin that makes the smell.

[laughs]

In what world does this guy...

I...

Also one of the points I wrote on my notes on this, like, hey, Professor Hitchens, like, control your freaking classroom.

Know who's coming in and out.

It's, it's bad security, it's bad policy, and, like, I feel bad for all the other kids who are like, "Hey, who's the old guy sitting in the back?" [laughs]

Why don't we, we're going in a little bit of reverse order, but I wanted to start with the book, but maybe you could tell us about your background and how you became a writer and historian.

Yeah, you know, I'm from Chicago originally.

And when I was in high school, I got really interested in journalism.

I had the opportunity to be part of a mentorship program through the National Association of Black Journalists, their chapter in Chicago.

And I met some really cool reporters who gave me a lot of advice about college and about careers.

I had an internship at the kind of advertorial section for the Chicago Tribune.

So I really thought my work would, I would just become a journalist.

Who's your favorite and what's the ensemble?

So it's, in some ways, right, when you think about how many other historical events could that many people tell you that much about Right?

Yes, and this makes me sad [laughs] as a historian, but you're absolutely right.

But I think what is fascinating about it is, like, how we got there.

'Cause if you look at the coverage of the March on Washington, it was clear that Martin Luther King Jr. was the standout of the day.

But when you look at the cover of Time and Life magazines after the event, Bayard Rustin, A. Philip Randolph, and Roy Wilkins were on the cover of magazines.

So, the determination that it was just King's moment comes a little bit later.

And I have a theory that because King is assassinated fewer than five years after the March on Washington, the I Have a Dream speech becomes an attempt to soften his image and impact during his lifetime and create a kind of warm idea of the civil rights movement, because there really isn't a reason why we couldn't remember his final oration the day before his assassination as the great King speech.

So we just had this about before, like, the, two of the greatest visual memories of, of the Reflecting Pool and of marches both happen to feature two iconic African Americans.

So it's in some ways, right, when you think about how many other historical events could that many people tell you that much about Right?

Yes, and this makes me sad [laughs] as a historian, but you're absolutely right.

But I think what is fascinating about it is, like, how we got there.

'Cause if you look at the coverage of the March on Washington, it was clear that Martin Luther King Jr. was the standout of the day.

But when you look at the cover of Time and Life magazines after the event, Bayard Rustin, A. Philip Randolph, and Roy Wilkins were on the cover of magazines.

So, the determination that it was just King's moment comes a little bit later.

And I have a theory that because King is assassinated fewer than five years after the March on Washington, the I Have a Dream speech becomes an attempt to soften his image and impact during his lifetime and create a kind of warm idea of the civil rights movement, because there really isn't a reason why we couldn't remember his final oration the day before his assassination as the great King speech.

So we just had this about before, like, the, two of the greatest visual memories of, of the Reflecting Pool and of marches both happen to feature two iconic African Americans.

Marsha, what

the fuck? What is going on with boys? So I've had this conversation with a mutual friend of the podcast, Ellen Marsh, and we've determined that we are the greatest generation because Xennials like ourselves...

We have rejected racism and sexism.

We have like towed the line.

But the reason we were able to do this on a lot of things is that like we're at that right generation where we actually gave a fuck about people's feelings.

Mm-hmm.

Yep.

Yeah, I think it's one of the reasons why adolescence, that TV show from last year, I think was so resonant that, you know, again, it was like, wow, grownups do not really understand what it is like to be a teen and growing up in this world right now.

like a

disaster.

So I'm like a chaos Muppet when I'm working on a project.

Okay.

So first I'm like, I'm going to write the story of the March on Washington from the perspective of the women.

Right.

And then the like deep dives, like, okay, here's the program of the March and here's the news coverage.

um that's interesting but it's like it's so hard as you said there's so much information toward in in this this part of history and not even a part like just as the vastness of this history it's nearly impossible to include it all and unfortunately i know i obviously know about the march on washington did i know about any of the women maybe some didn't you say in the book the march was about black women so walk me through that not only the racism that they experienced, but also the sexism that they were feeling within their own movement.

When you approach a book like this and you're going to focus in on the women, how do you identify, how do you frame the women?

This was so hard and I don't know why I thought this was going to be easier than every book is hard.

And I'm going to stop saying, oh, I think this project will be a little bit easier, but it's not right.

I think the big challenge was, you know, who would get the main stage? And this actually was really challenging because what I decided to do to just be disciplined in my practice is I decided the women who had been identified for a special tribute to black women Segment five, I believe in the March program would be the focus of the book.

And then all of the women entertainers who appear on the program.

And then I had to add Anna Hedgeman because she was the only woman on the executive committee based in New York.

And she's the one who made the argument for recognizing black women on the program.

Professor Chatelain, you thought what?

This,

the first draft of this book was like, I mean, just a disaster.

I wanted every detail.

I wanted, you know, it was like 600 pages of like foolishness.

And then, you know, I had to get some editorial feedback and comments that like, okay, where is the story starting and where are we ending? And so, you know, for each of these women, I really got to know a lot about their backgrounds.

And, you know, initially I had decided all of the women who were going to be honored at the march were plus all of the musical acts, plus Anna Hedgeman, because she really is the beginning of it.

It's because of her that there was any recognition of Black women in the movement.

think that we

Can you share maybe some of your, a couple of your favorite anecdotes from the book?

So a lot of these women are very intentionally and unintentionally very funny.

They have a sense of humor about themselves that I think is also important to incorporate in a book about something as serious as civil rights.

So, you know, I think the people that I found most fascinating are women like Anna Hedgeman, because she kind of turns on its head the narrative of like how civil rights leaders come to be.

She's from rural Minnesota.

She's in the only black family in this, you know, all white town.

And she doesn't go to the South until she's in her 20s.

We're like, they're messy, messy people.

Can you share maybe some of your, a couple of your favorite anecdotes from the book?

So a lot of these women are very intentionally and unintentionally very funny.

They have a sense of humor about themselves that I think is also important to incorporate in a book about something as serious as civil rights.

So, you know, I think the people that I found most fascinating are women like Anna Hedgeman, because she kind of turns on its head the narrative of like how civil rights leaders come to be.

She's from rural Minnesota.

She's in the only black family in this, you know, all white town.

And she doesn't go to the South until she's in her 20s.

We're like, they're messy, messy people.

Can you share maybe some of your, a couple of your favorite anecdotes from the book?

So a lot of these women are very intentionally and unintentionally very funny.

They have a sense of humor about themselves that I think is also important to incorporate in a book about something as serious as civil rights.

So, you know, I think the people that I found most fascinating are women like Anna Hedgeman, because she kind of turns on its head the narrative of like how civil rights leaders come to be.

She's from rural Minnesota.

She's in the only black family in this, you know, all white town.

And she doesn't go to the South until she's in her 20s.

We're like, they're messy, messy people.

Can you share maybe some of your, a couple of your favorite anecdotes from the book?

So a lot of these women are very intentionally and unintentionally very funny.

They have a sense of humor about themselves that I think is also important to incorporate in a book about something as serious as civil rights.

So, you know, I think the people that I found most fascinating are women like Anna Hedgeman, because she kind of turns on its head the narrative of like how civil rights leaders come to be.

She's from rural Minnesota.

She's in the only black family in this, you know, all white town.

And she doesn't go to the South until she's in her 20s.

We're like, they're messy, messy people.

do both at the same time.

But I think what I wanted was an opportunity to write... a group biography.

This is going to sound also ridiculous, but I read a group biography by Kenneth Mack called Representing the Race about civil rights lawyering maybe 15 years ago.

And this book just really struck me the way that he was able to take a group of people who are all from different places and backgrounds, but were all civil rights lawyers, and told this really powerful story about how Black lawyers and Black people in the legal world, how they built up their confidence, how they built up their thinking to take on some of these major civil rights issues.

So it's folks like Constance Baker Motley and Thurgood Marshall and how they become the people that we revere now.

And they had to start somewhere.

So he's talking about people taking public drunkenness cases and you know, divorce cases.

Who's important there? What are some of the key stories of some of these women?

So if you talk about her as well in this book.

I'm always fascinated by this kind of question about economics that undergird every moment, right? The reason I wrote Franchise was because I was like, well, how are we paying for this new vision of Black America? And so I wanted to understand Rosa Parks's life in 1963.

How does she get to the March on Washington? And that period of her life after the end of the Montgomery bus boycott is And 1967, 68, I think is so critically important because Rosa Parks is suffering economically.

She is suffering with her health.

She's suffering as a caretaker.

And everyone is talking about how someone should come and rescue her, and nobody does.

And I think that this is so emblematic of some of the tensions that we saw after the rise of the Movement for Black Lives and in 2020, where there were these high-profile cases of people and their families who were victims of police brutality, who were killed by police, and people are sending money to GoFundMes, and they're trying to do all these things for them.

Can you talk about what that kind of, what, how you think about that and why specifically the movement changed? wasn't maybe not even allowed someone like Diane Nash that might have been ready for the moment that didn't get to speak or something like that.

So putting together different types of archives and building an archive that allowed you to speak to that topic and the impact that franchising had in Black communities at a particular moment.

So I think the thing that I saw in a lot of scholars was the way that they built and created their own archives.

There's some really great examples across the field.

For me, not having access to a corporate archive, I think, was for the best because it really, really pushed me to expand my thinking about where does this particular institution of McDonald's, how does it ingratiate itself how does it build relationships with black communities in ways that maybe even inside of their own internal archives they aren't as clear about right because um you know initially i thought this was just a question about marketing right like what were the black ads that were on um you know television and radio and magazines um but what i discovered was you know That archive of marketing and consumer culture was just scratching the surface, right? That in order to build this relationship with a food brand, there's all of these different layers.

And I think not having access to their archive and the way that they organize that relationship, because I probably think of it in terms of the dawn of minority franchising and their investments in it.

but it's also about a set of relationships that Black people are coming into after the Civil Rights Act of 1964, are also coming into a consumer culture where they're trying to create products that are suited to their taste.

And so you go from using the chronological data framework of a corporation to then when you're building the archive, you're not so much concerned about chronology as the various layers necessary in order for us to get to this point.

So one, what made you interested in that topic? And what was the process of getting that information like? Because there are women who you were going to talk about in the book who have not been talked about in their relationship to the March on Washington more broadly, right?

[laughs]

So it's this idea of, like...

It's like, there's something very, very true about some of the, like, racial discrimination and dynamics within academia.

But because this is Law & Order, no one can address that in any kind of substantive way, so he's just awful, and weird, and kinda creepy.

And the other thing is, like, he's allegedly in his office at night grading papers.

The kinda guy that this is portraying, he doesn't grade papers.

He doesn't give papers.

But this isn't really up to anybody