Covert, Mich., is home to 2,600 residents today-1,200 Caucasians, 900 African-Americans and 500 Hispanics. That's an unusual mix for a rural Midwestern town, which, as Cox reveals, has an intriguing history. Focusing on the late 19th-century, Cox, a historian at Chicago's Newberry Library, recounts how Covert became racially integrated just after the Civil War and how its residents lived harmoniously thereafter, even as other American towns practiced segregation or ended up bedeviled by racial hatred. Some of the blacks who made their way to Covert had been born into slavery; others had always been free in name if not in practice. Many of the whites who made their way to Covert from the East arrived as confirmed abolitionists, with affiliations in some cases to the Congregational Church. Farming or logging mills provided steady income for most residents, and the relatively low level of poverty aided racial concord. Cox's frequent speculations about what specific Covert residents thought or did mar the book somewhat, and her flat prose fails to convey the vitality of the women and men she finds so fascinating. But Cox's optimism is infectious, and her recovery of Covert's nearly lost history admirable. (Feb. 6) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
After the Civil War, when the wider nation was turning its back on the promises of Reconstruction and its commitment to racial egalitarianism, blacks and whites in a small Michigan town lived together on a basis of singular racial equality. In her first book, Cox (scholar in residence, Newberry Lib.) traces the unique history of Covert from the 1860s to the 20th century. Drawing on a variety of sources, from obscure genealogical material to standard secondary studies, she intertwines the national scene of segregation and discrimination with a local story of relative racial equality. Six families, identified in a separate section, are the focus of this historic drama. Libraries with an interest in race relations in mid- to late 19th-century America, as well as those with the specific regional interest, would be wise to choose this distinctive work, even if they already own Sundiata Keita Cha-Jua's America's First Black Town: Brooklyn, Illinois, 1830-1915, a study of the country's first black-majority municipality.-Theresa McDevitt, Indiana Univ. of Pennsylvania Lib. Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
A gladdening, unsentimental chronicle of a Midwestern town that practiced racial equality against all late-19th-century odds. The town was Covert, Mich. "Starting in the 1860s the people of this place broke both laws and social expectations to develop a community of radical equality," writes Cox, scholar in residence at Chicago's Newberry Library. Though it was very much an abolitionist community, Covert was not a utopian experiment, the author makes plain. Yankees from Massachusetts, free black farmers from North Carolina, deeply accented Europeans, Native Americans and black frontier folk born and raised in the Midwest all gathered there to promote the idea that a vibrant community should tap the strengths of all its citizens. A series of small yet profound acts had big consequences. For example, a black man ran for elective office when it was still a crime, and a largely white electorate voted him in because he was the right person for the job. Working from local records, newspapers and personal reflections, Cox credits the town's integrated success to the most prosaic of reasons: Its residents were more interested in thriving economically than in expending energy on efforts to promote racism. "Covert's unusual culture not only blossomed but bore good harvest, while the rest of the nation saw the meager fruits of Reconstruction wither on the vine," the author notes. Still, it was never entirely about economic self-interest; Covertites were well aware of their anti-establishmentarianism and pursued it with thumb-nosing disregard for the bigotry in which the Midwest trafficked with gusto during the second half of the 19th century. After 50 years of going its own way, the town fell victimto changing demographics; as the graybeards died off, ignorance wheedled its way into the town's fabric, and Covert's rare time faded. Covert well deserves the limelight thrown by Cox as a grand example of decency and defiance of Jim Crow's gathering venality.
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Atlanta Journal-Constitution - Diane Roberts
Chronicle
Historical Society of Michigan
A Stronger Kinship will enjoy its prose, admire its characters, and very likely agree with Cox that the history of this small Michigan town teaches us about hope and the possibility for racial reconciliation in our own time.”—Frank Towers, Chicago Tribune
Chicago Tribune - Frank Towers
Michigan Historical Review
Michigan Historical Review
"Anna-Lisa Cox brings us the remarkable story of this extraordinary place, Covert, Michigan. Intensively researched and well crafted, this inspirational story gives the reader a glimpse of the way the people of one town chose to live their lives, regardless of the social norms of the time."
Historical Society of Michigan Chronicle
"Books about race in America are often disturbing and sometimes downright searing. Still, so many exist that they sometimes tend to blend together, canceling one another out. A Stronger Kinship is such an unusual book about race in America that it is unlikely to blend with anything else."
— Steve Weinberg, Dallas Morning News
"This is a revealing look at a small town whose accomplishments have been virtually forgotten."
"A wonderful book. . . . Stories like this need to get around sooner than later. They are what will save this world."
"An inspirational story of tolerance and decency."
— Diane Robert, Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
"Readers of A Stronger Kinship will enjoy its prose, admire its characters, and very likely agree with Cox that the history of this small Michigan town teaches us about hope and the possibility for racial reconciliation in our own time."
— Frank Towers, Chicago Tribune
