Strange Fruit, Ida B Wells (and Kate Beaton again) Catherine Johnson

In the 19th and the early part of the 20th centuries lynching was a not uncommon occurrence in the Southern States of America. Of course lynching is not unique to this part of the world. In every country at one time or another the powerful have extracted summary punishments on the less powerful with or without reason.

But in the Southern states, right up until the civil right movement, lynchings were public spectacles, crowds would gather, postcards were produced as souvenirs, members of the crowd might point out to interested relatives exactly where they stood in relation to the victim. Or as in the picture below, from a 1930s lynching, smile for the camera. By the way, the girls are holding shreds of murdered men's clothes (two were hung in this case) which were highly prized souvenirs. 

 From Without Sanctuary Allen, et al.

Sometimes we forget that there were people fighting against this kind of horror long before even Billie Holliday sang a note. And thanks to artist Kate Beaton (she draws the marvellous Hark! A Vagrant strips)  I learnt about Ida B. Wells, a writer, educator, mother, feminist, and activist who fought against lynch law and for equality her entire life.

Ida B Wells was a firebrand and a blazing star who deserves recognition here, as well as in the USA. She was born in 1862, a slave, just months before the emancipation act in 1863. Her parents believed in education and she was sent to college, leaving only when her parents and baby brother died in order that she could work as a teacher and support her remaining siblings. She later attended evening classes at Fisk University and was the first black woman to write for a white newspaper. She toured the world speaking out against the horrors of lynching after her co workers in a community store she set up were lynched. (The stores' white owned competitor was not happy).

Not only that she refused to give up her seat in a railway carriage and protested in 1893 against the exclusion of blacks from the Chicago World Exposition.

And that's not all - she was one of the first women in public life to actively keep her own name and not take her husbands' after marriage. She had four children, wrote a heap of books and set up the National Association of Colored Women, which became part of the NAACP.

Her later life was concerned mostly with education and writing and she died, aged 68 in 1931, as many of us might want to in mid sentence, writing a book.

Ida B Wells by Kate Beaton

If you'd like to learn more

her writing is free here
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Southern-Horrors-Lynch-Law-Phases-ebook/dp/B0084CGSRA/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1399988558&sr=1-2&keywords=ida+b+wells

And there's a rather wonderful biography by Mia Bay : To Tell the Truth Freely
http://us.macmillan.com/totellthetruthfreely/MiaBay

And because there is never enough Kate Beaton ever there's a link to a series of comic strips about Ida B Wells  below.
http://www.harkavagrant.com/index.php?id=356

Catherine Johnson's latest book is Sawbones, an 18th century forensic murder mystery.

Christmas, Paris and Kate Beaton Catherine Johnson

There have been some fantastic posts here, so thoughtful and entertaining and erudite. This will not be one of those. I am currently in Revolutionary France in my head and as with all writing sometimes it is the hardest thing and sometimes you have to stop yourself thinking too hard and give in to the impulse of the story and just let it carry you away and onwards and mop up the mess afterwards.

I use a lot of maps when I write historical novels, and there are some cracking maps of Paris before, during and afterwards, when road names changed to things like Rue de l'Hommes Arme, Rue du Contrat Social and Rue des Droits de l'Homme.  

This one's from's 1792. I've used it extensively, imagining how you'd get around, gauging distances and doing a sort of analogue version of Google Streetview which involves dragging your brain down to street level and looking around.

But because of this I have rather let Christmas drift by. I was hoping I might squeeze in a very late present to myself which involved long walks round the city. But alas I've been writing and there are no decorations, the tree is still outside and the freezer is empty. I haven't even bought all my books.

So on that note I thought I'd recommend some disparate and diverting reading. Rush along to your local independent bookshop quick sharp.

Georgian London  Into the Streets  by Lucy Inglis.  I so wish this book had been published when I started writing historical novels. It would have saved me a lot of time. This is a wonderful book with so much useful and fascinating information, law and order, the stink of the tanneries, the bustle of Covent Garden and the mystery of Bow Wow Pie amongst many others. I knew nothing of Southwark's melon pits or Hackney's orange trees and there's loads of wonderful pictures and maps. It's a really useful guide for any reader who's interested in how the metropolis came of age. And I've just noticed it's been shortlisted for the Longman History Book of the Year.

The Big Con by David W. Maurer. Jump forward a couple of hundred years and immerse yourself in the argot and culture of late nineteenth and early twentieth century America. This is a book written by a linguist about the world of Confidence Tricksters. The Sting - the film with Robert Redford and Paul Newman was made on the back of the information in this book. It's full of wonderful and specific criminal slang too, which is always a plus.

Hark! A Vagrant by Kate Beaton.  If you have never come across the drawings of Kate Beaton you are in for such a treat. She is a Canadian cartoonist who draws (not always) historical cartoon strips. My personal copy is adorned with a hand drawn sketch of Matthew Henson heading north. I wrote loads of sentences trying to explain them, but you're better off having a look yourself. But consequently I have not done any work at all this afternoon re reading them, and laughing. Here's the link  http://harkavagrant.com/

Happy Holidays

My book Sawbones is out now too http://www.booktrust.org.uk/books/view/33334