Coming of Age in Mississippi

Many events in Anne Moody’s life led up to the final conclusion of the book. She begins with her childhood by describing the tiny houses her family had lived in, children left by themselves because parents have to work, and her housecleaning jobs after-school that she began at the age of nine to help her family eat. Throughout all of this hardship during her childhood she stays motivated and earns scholarships to put herself through college. Through all of this, her thoughts are continuously consumed with the racism and discrimination that surrounds her. She describes finding her own name on a Ku Klux Klan wanted list, seeing a boy beaten as FBI agents watch from across the street, and hearing of murders - Emmet Till, Medgar Evars, John F. Kennedy, as well as her own uncle. She lives her life knowing she can no longer return safely to her hometown and feels estranged from family members who do not share her passionate commitment to fight racism. At the conclusion of the book we are left with Anne, as well as many other activists for equal rights, who have left on a bus to go to Washington D.C. to testify at the COFO hearings. Their mission was to finally gain equal rights once and for all after all of the battling they had

It was during these years that Anne appeared to start building up her courage to fight discrimination. All of the events in Anne"tms life brought her to the conclusion she did. She was never able to get an answer. I would have come to a similar outlook as Anne did. She wasn"tmt sure how to answer to those who were asking her if things were actually going to get straightened out in Washington D. She was always interested in what made blacks different from whites. When she was on the bus going to Washington D. She had always known there was an obvious difference between whites and blacks. After Anne had finally received the information on what the NAACP was all about she was forbidden to talk about it and to pretend she didn"tmt know anything around white people. While at the bus station she insisted they use the white entrance. Sure, many appearance have changed, but I feel that there will always be some form of discrimination. Anne"tms mother explained that they just weren"tmt allowed to sit downstairs and couldn"tmt do things with other white children. As Anne moved into her high school years she was able to understand the happenings going on around her. " She had known that NAACP had something to do with black people, but wasn"tmt sure what its purpose was.