Mississippi Notebook

Nicholas von Hoffman (1929–2018) was an American journalist and author. He worked as a community organizer for Saul Alinsky in Chicago and wrote for The Washington Post, among other publications. Henry Herr Gill (1930–2025) was a photojournalist who worked for the Chicago Daily News and the Chicago Sun-Times, among other newspapers. His work led to assignments in ninety-two countries, and his photographs and films in the world’s hot spots have been highly acclaimed. Charles W. McKinney Jr. is professor of history at Rhodes College. He is author of Greater Freedom: The Evolution of the Civil Rights Struggle in Wilson, North Carolina and coeditor of An Unseen Light: Black Struggles for Freedom in Memphis, Tennessee and From Rights to Lives: The Evolution of the Black Freedom Struggle.

PRAISE FOR THE ORIGINAL 1964 EDITION:"Von Hoffman, an unusually keen observer, asks a barbed question when he inquires as to ‘why we—all of us in America—allowed a situation to degenerate to the point where no other politics but revolutionary politics verging on warfare is possible?’ Included are more than fifty photographs taken by Henry Herr Gill during the ten-week visit he and von Hoffman made to Mississippi. The report and the pictures combine to make a superb job of reporting." — Jack A. Rye (The Sacramento Bee)"A model of reportage. Von Hoffman is a trained and objective observer." — Los Angeles Times "Mississippi Notebook is a rare blend of compassion and hard-nosed realism. . . . It is sensitive yet brutally honest, and by far the best account I have read of the nature and significance of that summer’s tragic events." — Charles E. Silberman, author of Crisis in Black and White""A splendid job of imaginative, responsible reporting." — James W. Silver, author of Mississippi: The Closed Society