Fire in the Streets: America in the 1960s

This was one of several required books for an American Studies class I had in college. I learned so much from this book. Each chapter tackled different issues/themes that were so defining for that era.

The book was a very easy to read book, and fun to read. There was a lot of information in the book that was very interesting. Milton Viorst the author, did a great job depicting what went on in this era without over doing it. He got the main information out, and explained why someone meets someone. Like with Rubin and Hoffman. Viorst explained easily that Rubin met Hoffman because Rubin was out trying to find people who didn't like the militant views. It was really interesting on how he didn't just do the big stars of the sixties but the people that weren't as huge. Many people don't know that Rudolph and Rustin were the real ones behind the March on Washington. Many people think it was all Martin Luther King's idea. I thought that he picked people and events that were interesting, like Rubin, the riots of Watts, Freedom Riders. It was also really good to learn that even though blacks at the time were oppressed, they had a lot of power, and MLK was the one who controlled and used it wisely. Like the candidates Nixon and Kennedy. No one off the street knows that the black population really decided who one the elections. The only thing that was not good about the book was that Viorst stopped on one person and went on to the other. Many readers may be wanting to read about that person more but then the book goes on to a different topic. This happened on page 432, where it is talking about the assaults of Chicago, and then goes to MLK. The only other thing was Viorst didn't have to go into the childhood of the people he talked about, Viorst draws you in on what happening when someone is thirty then goes this person was born in Alabama in a new paragraph.