Fight On, My Soul
- ISBN-10
- 0980008468
- ISBN-13
- 9780980008463
- Category
- Biography & Autobiography
- Pages
- 328
- Language
- English
- Published
- 2009
- Publisher
- The Write Place
- Author
- James E.C. Norris
Description
A Virginia man's fight against poverty, disease, and discrimination forms the background of Fight On, My Soul. Set largely in rural Lancaster County, Virginia, Fight On, My Soul tells the story of Morgan E. Norris, one of Virginia's first black physicians, who believed in himself enough to overcome the daily struggles of his life and his time. Told by his son, this meticulously researched biography is a moving story that captures Norris's struggle to provide better conditions for his family and beloved patients. James Norris says of his father. "When barriers were raised and obstacles thrown, his modus operandi would be first to try to wend his way around them, and failing that, to blast them down!" Norris's life spanned the contentious period from post-Reconstruction to the relentless erosion of civil liberties for blacks, the encoding of segregation into law, and finally the collapse of Jim Crow. Norris died in 1966, just about the same time as Jim Crow, but when he died it was still illegal for a white to marry a Negro in Virginia, and the American Medical Association had yet to disavow local and state societies that discriminated against Negro physicians. Norris could have chosen to go with the flow, to move north to less conflicted environs, or even pass for white. But for Norris, none of these choices fit. He chose first to become educated and then to return to boyhood home in remote Virginia. In doing so, he fulfilled a pledge he had made to his dying father: to become a doctor and make sure no one in his little insular community would suffer as his father had. In telling his father's narrative, James Norris illuminates the delicate balance between defiance of systemic racial practices and working within a system that stubbornly resisted change.
Get the book
Similar books
-
The Lost Founding Father: John Quincy Adams and the Transformation of American Politics
By William J. CooperA middle-aged widower, Eaton had recently married Margaret O'Neale Timberlake, the daughter of a Washington tavern keeper. Her first marriage had been to a ...
-
Jesse James was His Name: Or, Fact and Fiction Concerning the Careers of the Notorious James Brothers of Missouri
By William A. Settle10 When the funeral party reached Kearney she cried out to Sheriff Timberlake , " Oh , Mr. Timberlake , my son has gone to God , but his friends still live ...
-
The Age of Jackson and the Art of American Power, 1815-1848
By William R. NesterLt. John Timberlake was smitten, talked her into marrying him, and then was forced to leave his bride for an extended naval voyage.
-
Joan Crawford: The Essential Biography
By Lawrence J. Quirk, William SchoellThe supporting cast, including Lionel Barrymore as Jackson, Tone as Eaton, Robert Taylor as Timberlake, and James Stewart as another persistent suitor, ...
-
Conversations with William Faulkner
By M. Thomas IngeStudent assistant Corrie E. Ward and faculty secretaries Nina Wells and Susan G. Timberlake provided invaluable assistance .
-
Memoirs and Selected Letters: Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant, Selected Letters 1839-1865
By Ulysses S. GrantKroper Priate WAZ e Hale curie Tarner Zur National Forces . ... N. MICHLER , nie22 Ernest 2 Maj . of Engineers , M.Guna Timberlake Wins Zone For HRJohnson ...
-
Inventing Loreta Velasquez: Confederate Soldier Impersonator, Media Celebrity, and Con Artist
By William C. DavisAccording to Robert E. L. Krick of Richmond in an e-mail message, the only likely candidates ... the prison adjutant, and a clerk known only as Timberlake.
-
William Shakespeare: A Textual Companion
By Stanley Wells, Gary Taylor, William MontgomeryEdward A. Bloom ( 1964 ) ; revised in Muir , Shakespeare the Professional ( 1973 ) ... A. W. Pollard ( 1923 ) , 57-112 Timberlake , Philip W. , The Feminine ...
-
The Age of Jackson and the Art of American Power, 1815-1848
By William NesterRichard Timberlake, 7746 Origins of Central Banking in the United States ... 1820, in Thomas Jefferson, 7726 Selected I/Vritings of 7740mas]e erson, ed.
-
Escape: A Memoir
By Carolyn Jessop, Laura PalmerWe'd picked the green tomatoes just before the frost and let them ripen in buckets. Every day we'd sort through them looking for some that were ripe enough ...