Through a tough-minded mix of journalism and oral history, Patsy Sims chronicles daily life in a community of impoverished workers behind southern Louisiana's "cane curtain" in the 1970s. The world of the sugar cane plantations, isolated by rows of densely grown stalks, defined the lives of the blacks who lived and labored there, cut off from any prospects of better conditions by the wall of exploitation erected by the white growers. In 1972, two of the cane workers, backed by a small, courageous labor advocacy group, sued ...
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Through a tough-minded mix of journalism and oral history, Patsy Sims chronicles daily life in a community of impoverished workers behind southern Louisiana's "cane curtain" in the 1970s. The world of the sugar cane plantations, isolated by rows of densely grown stalks, defined the lives of the blacks who lived and labored there, cut off from any prospects of better conditions by the wall of exploitation erected by the white growers. In 1972, two of the cane workers, backed by a small, courageous labor advocacy group, sued the Department of Agriculture over irregularities in the process by which their minimum wages were set. At stake were three months of retroactive pay for twelve thousand laborers. To the powerful sugar interest groups, the lawsuit was an outrage; to the workers, it was a chance to begin to redeem the century of intermittent apathy and bloody labor unrest that had followed the end of slavery. Sims, then a reporter for the New Orleans States-Item, went on extended assignment to gauge local reaction to the lawsuit and to investigate substandard housing, poor nutrition, and inadequate job safety. She had been on the story for two weeks when a young worker, Cleveland Benjamin, was crushed to death beneath an overturned tractor. From this tragic departure point, the reader enters the world of America's forgotten poor. Described at length by the workers themselves, it is a world ordered by the most cynical remnants of Old South patriarchal attitudes, a world where all but a few in positions to help the workers have been coerced into inaction. Throughout the account, however one is impressed not only by the workers' hardships but by their perseverance and hope. A shorteredition of Cleveland Benjamin's Dead was published in 1981. Critically acclaimed, the book was compared by reviewers to both The Grapes of Wrath and Let Us Now Praise Famous Men. This new edition restores material omitted from the first, including two complete chapters. A new, fuller
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Add this copy of Cleveland Benjamin's Dead: a Struggle for Dignity in to cart. $7.58, very good condition, Sold by HPB-Diamond rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Dallas, TX, UNITED STATES, published 1994 by Univ of Georgia Pr.
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Add this copy of Cleveland Benjamin's Dead: a Struggle for Dignity in to cart. $15.00, like new condition, Sold by Black Swan Books, Inc. rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Lexington, KY, UNITED STATES, published by University of Georgia Press.
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Illustrated by Mitchel L. Osborne. Fine in Fine dust jacket. As New. Illustrated with black-and-white photographs. The dust jacket is protected by a Brodart mylar cover and is not clipped. Not an ex-library copy. No remainder marks. No names or marks in the text. Most books shipped within 24 hours. All books mailed with Delivery Confirmation. Fine condition in fine dust jacket. Selling Used and Rare books on line since April 1998 and from our bookstore in the heart of the Bluegrass since 1984.; Black-and-white photographs; 8vo.; 247 pages.
Add this copy of Cleveland Benjamin's Dead: a Struggle for Dignity in to cart. $20.00, like new condition, Sold by Old New York Book Shop rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Atlanta, GA, UNITED STATES, published 1994 by University of Georgia Press.
Add this copy of Cleveland Benjamin's Dead: a Struggle for Dignity in to cart. $38.39, good condition, Sold by Bonita rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Hialeah, FL, UNITED STATES, published 1994 by Univ of Georgia Pr.
Add this copy of Cleveland Benjamin's Dead: a Struggle for Dignity in to cart. $102.85, new condition, Sold by GridFreed rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from North Las Vegas, NV, UNITED STATES, published 1994 by University of Georgia Press.
