Lay Bare the Heart: An Autobiography of the Civil Rights Movement

Texas native James Farmer was one of the "Big Four" leaders of the civil rights movement, along with Martin Luther King, Jr., Roy Wilkins and Whitney Young. Farmer might be called the forgotten man of the movement, overshadowed by King, who was deeply influenced by Farmer's application of Ghandi's principles of nonviolent protest. Born in Marshall, Texas, in 1920, Farmer was the founding director of the Congress of Racial Equality in 1942. Under Farmer's direction, CORE set the pattern for the Civil Rights movement by organizing sit-ins and peaceful protests, beginning with a 1942 sit-in at a coffee shop in the University of Chicago area. In Lay Bare the Heart Farmer tells the story of the heroic civil rights struggle of the 1950s and 1960s. This moving and unsparing personal account captures both the inspiring strengths and human weaknesses of the movement.