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The Family Tree
- A Lynching in Georgia, a Legacy of Secrets, and My Search for the Truth
- Narrated by: Pam Ward
- Length: 9 hrs
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Publisher's summary
Harris County, Georgia, 1912. A White man, the beloved nephew of the county sheriff, is shot dead on the porch of a Black woman. Days later, the sheriff sanctions the lynching of a Black woman and three Black men, all of them innocent.
For Karen Branan, the great-granddaughter of that sheriff, this isn't just history; this is family history. Branan spent nearly 20 years combing through diaries and letters, hunting for clues in libraries and archives throughout the United States to piece together the events and motives that led a group of people to murder four of their fellow citizens in such a brutal public display. Her research revealed surprising new insights into the day-to-day reality of race relations in the Jim Crow-era South, but what she ultimately discovered was far more personal.
A gripping story of privilege and power, anger, and atonement, The Family Tree transports listeners to a small Southern town steeped in racial tension and bound by powerful family ties. Branan takes us back in time to the Civil War, demonstrating how plantation politics and the Lost Cause movement set the stage for the fiery racial dynamics of the 20th century.
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By: Jefferson Morley
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By Hands Now Known
- Jim Crow's Legal Executioners
- By: Margaret A. Burnham
- Narrated by: Diana Blue
- Length: 10 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Margaret A. Burnham challenges our understanding of the Jim Crow era by exploring the relationship between formal law and background legal norms in harrowing cases between 1920 and 1960. From rendition, the legal process by which states make claims to other states for the return of their citizens, to battles over state and federal jurisdiction and the outsize role of local sheriffs in enforcing racial hierarchy, Burnham maps the criminal legal system of the mid-twentieth-century South, and traces the line from slavery to the legal structures of this period—and through to today.
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Heartbreaking
- By sharon on 11-24-22
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They Called Themselves the KKK
- By: Susan Campbell Bartoletti
- Narrated by: Dion Graham, Susan Campbell Bartoletti
- Length: 4 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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"Boys, let us get up a club." Six restless young men raided the linens at a friend's mansion, pulled pillowcases over their heads, hopped on horses, and cavorted through the streets of Pulaski, Tennessee. The six friends named their club the Ku Klux Klan, and, all too quickly, their club grew into the self-proclaimed Invisible Empire with secret dens spread across the South. This is the story of how a secret terrorist group took root in America's democracy.
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not about the kkk
- By Randy on 08-24-10
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American Crucifixion
- The Murder of Joseph Smith and the Fate of the Mormon Church
- By: Alex Beam
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard
- Length: 10 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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On June 27, 1844, a mob stormed the jail in the dusty frontier town of Carthage, Illinois. Clamorous and angry, they were hunting down a man they saw as a grave threat to their otherwise quiet lives: The founding prophet of Mormonism, Joseph Smith. They wanted blood. At thirty-nine years old, Smith had already lived an outsized life. In addition to starting the Church of Latter-Day Saints and creating his own "Golden Bible" - the Book of Mormon - he had worked as a water-dowser and treasure hunter.
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All religious histories are not created equal
- By Kendra on 07-01-14
By: Alex Beam
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Righteous Troublemakers
- Untold Stories of the Social Justice Movement in America
- By: Al Sharpton
- Narrated by: Al Sharpton
- Length: 10 hrs
- Unabridged
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Righteous Troublemakers shines a light on everyday people called to do extraordinary things—like Pauli Murray, whose early work inspired Thurgood Marshall, Claudette Colvin, who refused to give up her seat on a segregated bus months before Rosa Parks did the same, and Gwen Carr, whose private pain in losing her son Eric Garner stoked her public activism against police brutality. Sharpton also gives his personal take on more widely known individuals, revealing overlooked details, historical connections, and a perspective informed by years of working in the social justice movement.
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Thank God for this book knowledge is power
- By JOAN REID on 02-23-22
By: Al Sharpton
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Emmett Till
- The Murder That Shocked the World and Propelled the Civil Rights Movement
- By: Devery S. Anderson
- Narrated by: Brandon Church
- Length: 21 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Emmett Till offers the first truly comprehensive account of the 1955 murder and its aftermath. It tells the story of Emmett Till, the 14-year-old African American boy from Chicago brutally lynched for a harmless flirtation at a country store in the Mississippi Delta. His death and the acquittal of his killers by an all-white jury set off a firestorm of protests that reverberated all over the world and spurred on the civil rights movement.
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An important story narrated with power and warmth
- By R. Nance on 10-04-16
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Midnight Rising
- John Brown and the Raid That Sparked the Civil War
- By: Tony Horwitz
- Narrated by: Dan Oreskes
- Length: 11 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Plotted in secret, launched in the dark, John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry was a pivotal moment in U.S. history. But few Americans know the true story of the men and women who launched a desperate strike at the slaveholding South. Now, Midnight Rising portrays Brown's uprising in vivid color, revealing a country on the brink of explosive conflict. Brown, the descendant of New England Puritans, saw slavery as a sin against America's founding principles. Unlike most abolitionists, he was willing to take up arms, and in 1859 he prepared for battle at a hideout in Maryland....
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Up from Obscurity
- By Lynn on 06-18-12
By: Tony Horwitz
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Arc of Justice
- A Saga of Race, Civil Rights, and Murder in the Jazz Age
- By: Kevin Boyle
- Narrated by: Lizan Mitchell
- Length: 17 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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The grandson of a slave, Dr. Ossian Sweet moved his family to an all-white Detroit neighborhood in 1925. When his neighbors attempted to drive him out, Sweet defended himself, resulting in the death of a white man and a murder trial for Sweet. There followed one of the most important (and shockingly unknown) cases in Civil Rights history. Also caught up in the intense courtroom drama were legal giant Clarence Darrow and the newly formed National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).
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Gripping narrative
- By Chris on 04-13-09
By: Kevin Boyle
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Life of a Klansman
- A Family History in White Supremacy
- By: Edward Ball
- Narrated by: Edward Ball
- Length: 15 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Life of a Klansman tells the story of a warrior in the Ku Klux Klan, a carpenter in Louisiana who took up the cause of fanatical racism during the years after the Civil War. Edward Ball, a descendant of the Klansman, paints a portrait of his family’s anti-Black militant that is part history, part memoir rich in personal detail.
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Thought Provoking, But . . .
- By William G. Stuart on 09-01-20
By: Edward Ball
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The Bloody Shirt
- Terror after Appomattox
- By: Stephen Budiansky
- Narrated by: Phil Gigante
- Length: 9 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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From 1866 to 1876, more than 3,000 free African Americans and their white allies were killed in cold blood by terrorist organizations in the South. Over the years, this fact would not only be forgotten, but a series of exculpatory myths would arise to cover the tracks of this orchestrated campaign of atrocity and violence.
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Boring
- By W. Max Hollmann on 09-16-08
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The Feud
- The Hatfields and McCoys: The True Story
- By: Dean King
- Narrated by: Dan Woren
- Length: 12 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Filled with bitter quarrels, reckless affairs, treacherous betrayals, relentless mercenaries, and courageous detectives, The Feud is the riveting story of two frontier families struggling for survival within the narrow confines of an unforgiving land. It is a formative American tale, and in it, we see the reflection of our own family bonds and the lengths to which we might go in order to defend our honor, our loyalties, and our livelihood.
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Get out the pad and pencil .....
- By Alan on 10-15-13
By: Dean King
What listeners say about The Family Tree
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Darryl C. Brooks
- 05-26-17
Courageous.
Karen Branan's courageous telling of the darkside of her own family history finds authentic Redemption. Her story captures the challenges as well as the essence of our collective demons of Race relations that still haunt us all as a nation. Her story is discloses demon of unresolved and unacknowledged social history of that continues to haunt and quietly devour countless American families.
It's a must read for those of us with Southern roots. It also is a great read for those seeking to deepen their understsnding of the social history and ongoing challenges of Race in the US.
Amazing.
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- tralang
- 05-02-16
Enlightening and Poignant!
As a lifelong amateur genealogist and a Georgia native, I found this book most enlightening. It answered many questions about how my grandmother, who recently died at the age of 101, developed her attitudes, ethics, character and nature. It vastly explained her social history and the environment in which she spent her formative years. I am grateful to the author for her obviously thorough research and her brutally honest depiction of a history we Southerners often hide because it is one we cannot change. This must have been a frightening but oh so necessary venture and the author handles it with a brilliant blend of head and heart.
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- Catherine S. Read
- 08-12-16
Brilliantly Written and Read
Such a wonderful journey through a family history that illuminates many of the racial issues we are dealing with today. Excessive use of force against blacks by law enforcement is the modern day system of lynching. We can't deal with a modern day problem without first understanding its history.
My family owned slaves in Virginia. Many people may not know their own family history, which is all the more reason to understand this family's history. They are more typical than exceptional and we need to own that in this country.
I would highly recommend this book to readers of every age and background.
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- S. Brunner
- 02-23-20
Brave, powerful storytelling
An incredibly brave and honest look at the past. I like that the research that went into the book is included alongside the story.
Narration is FANTASTIC. I’ve listened to a lot of audiobooks, so I feel confident in saying this is one of the best narrations you’ll find!
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- N.Reed
- 11-14-17
Very Visual
Dirty little secrets of my home town(Columbus, Ga). Give it a read if you have the time.
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