Evening star., 1947-04-06
The Making OF 4 Southerner.
ALFRED 4. Knopf; 80
Reviewed BY
DONALD n. MUGRIDGE.

Like Richard Wright's @Blacl
Boy, .'The Making Of Southern
err b autobiograpfical In form bui
|in substance almost exclusively con-
cerned with tbs relation Of the white
and black races In the South.
But whereas Mr.. Wright told the
story Of his youth with torrential
violence seldom paralleled. Miss
Lumpkin presents her earlier life IN
q contemplative and analytical man.
ner, with the dignity one would ex-
pect from 90 eminent . social scieIi-
tist.
She has furthermore restudied her
family traditions and her youthful
memories In the light Of effectively
recorded factsthis Is an autobiog-
raphy with = good-sised bibliogra-
phyl sE
The result Is m almost unique
blend OF historical and social analy-
sis with the intensity that can only
result from personal experience.
{ II Miss Lumpkin had more Of the
magic Of style or-wl1at Is perhaps
the same thing could evoke more
adequately In the reader the emo
tional tone OF her own experience,
this might well have been . great
book: 1t Is on any count sincere,
searching. distinguished and Inn
portant one. But she Is less inter-
ested In herself than she Is In the
racial problem and how she came to
think OF 1t as she does now, and so
she. presents her personal history
for the elements Of generality which
1t contains and maintains cool i'm
personality when there seems small
reason for 1t.
'AThe Making of Southerner" Is
in outline the story OF how Col. Will
liam w. Lumpkin's daughter evolved
into DR.. Lumpkin, research director
of the Institute OF Labor Studies
and advocate OF racial equality.
This could be no easy process, for
the colonel was the scion OF q
famous Georgia planter clan, for
whom . county and town are
named, and who gave to the State
one of its best-known Governors,
Wilson Lumpkin, and many other
leaders in politics, law and the pro-
LESSONS. At Is, with Sherman
pounding at the gates Of Atlanta, he
went OF to join Wheeler's cavalry
and saw nearly year OF desperate
campaigning. The war stripped him
of his heritage. the old plantation
and its way of life. He read law
with Alexander H. Stephens, Vice
President of the Confederacy, and
became minor railroad official, but
his heart was in the celebration OF
the lost cause, the maintenance OF
white supremacy" and the organi-
zation of the United Veterans Of the
Confederacy.
AS q child, Katharine would ac-
company her father and give recfta-
tions before camp" Of these vet
Grams in q village near her home.
Two poignant experiences marked
the course OF her development: The
first when the sight, through the
ODC1 kltCilSA WlilAOWs VA 2iSi A0eAASA
Gaming a defenseless Negress. the
cook who had dared to answer
back" her mistress. woke her to the
implications of white supremacy.
The second was when the YWCA
conference which she was attending
agreed to let Miss Arthur, Negro
staff member. address them.
Miss Lumpkin and her friends
told each other afterward how
our pulses had hammered, and how
we could feel our hearts pound In
our chests" There are many other
mileposts, less striking than these.
before Miss Lumpkin, apparently
about 1926, finally rejected the doc
trine of racial inferiority, and with
1t the entire peculiar set Of ways
which it allegedly justified
For this conversion-for such 1t
deserves to be called-she now In
clines to give less credit to religion
than to her realization Of economic