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Moon U.S. Civil Rights Trail

A Traveler's Guide to the People, Places, and Events that Made the Movement

Contributors

By Deborah D. Douglas

Formats and Prices

Price

$24.99

Price

$30.99 CAD

The U.S. Civil Rights Trail offers a vivid glimpse into the story of Black America’s fight for freedom and equality. From eye-opening landmarks to celebrations of triumph over adversity, experience a tangible piece of history with Moon U.S. Civil Rights Trail.
  • Flexible Itineraries: Travel the entire trail through the South, or take a weekend getaway to Charleston, Birmingham, Jackson, Memphis, Washington DC, and more places significant to the Civil Rights Movement
  • Historic Civil Rights Sites: Learn about Dr. King’s legacy at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, be transformed at the small but mighty Emmett Till Intrepid Center, and stand tall with Little Rock Nine at their memorial in Arkansas
  • The Culture of the Movement: Get to know the voices, stories, music, and flavors that shape and celebrate Black America both then and now. Take a seat at a lunch counter where sit-ins took place or dig in to heaping plates of soul food and barbecue. Spend the day at museums that connect our present to the past or spend the night in the birthplace of the blues
  • Expert Insight: Award-winning journalist Deborah Douglas offers her valuable perspective and knowledge, including suggestions for engaging with local communities by supporting Black-owned businesses and seeking out activist groups
  • Travel Tools: Find driving directions for exploring the sites on a road trip, tips on where to stay, and full-color photos and maps throughout
  • Detailed coverage of: Charleston, Atlanta, Selma to Montgomery, Birmingham, Jackson, the Mississippi Delta, Little Rock, Memphis, Nashville, Raleigh, Durham, Virginia, and Washington DC
  • Foreword by Bree Newsome Bass: activist, filmmaker, and artist 
Journey through history, understand struggles past and present, and get inspired to create a better future with Moon U.S. Civil Rights Trail.
 

About Moon Travel Guides: Moon was founded in 1973 to empower independent, active, and conscious travel. We prioritize local businesses, outdoor recreation, and traveling strategically and sustainably. Moon Travel Guides are written by local, expert authors with great stories to tell—and they can’t wait to share their favorite places with you.

For more inspiration, follow @moonguides on social media.

Series:

  • "With this superb book—at once a reference work and a travel guide—about locations pivotal to the U.S. civil rights movement, Douglas raises the bar for other historically oriented travel books...Laden with information, this affecting guide provides a nuanced and powerful representation of Black Americans’ fight for freedom and equality. For every library."
    Library Journal
  • “This guidebook provides a severely under-covered travel adventure, explained clearly, with impressive research breadth and depth. Journalist Deborah D. Douglas mixes history with contemporary knowledge to inspire civil rights-related travel as a concept and then illuminates how that concept plays out in 13 separate geographic locales.”
    Society of American Travel Writers’ Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism Awards
  • "Douglas uses her journalism skills to bring the history of these sites to life by profiling the people who make them what they are today, local restaurants to enjoy and even a playlist of music to enjoy along the way."
    NPR
  • "Moon U.S. Civil Rights Trail, written by award-winning journalist and professor Deborah D. Douglas, opens up an opportunity for direct interaction with Black communities, landmarks, cultural staples and many overlooked yet significant locations in the history of the civil rights movement of the 1950s and '60s."
    NBC News
  • "The book is an invitation to explore that history [outside our front doors], and to embrace our role in shaping it for the better every day."
    The Washington Post
  • "From the port where enslaved Africans entered America to the home where Medgar Evers was murdered, a new guidebook helps readers explore for themselves the history, the landmarks and the watershed moments of the Black American struggle for equality and justice."
    Associated Press
  • "It reads like a friend’s travel recommendation, not a stuffy guidebook, and captures the importance of each location...There are detailed maps and beautiful, full color photos which make you want to hop in the car and grab a plate of fried chicken from The Four Way. It’s a travel guide you won’t want to miss out on reading."
    The Covington Leader
  • "Douglas’ care for ethical travel involves utmost respect for the business owners and residents along the trail."
    NewsNation Now
  • "With profiles of national leaders and local heroes, helpful timelines, a suggested playlist and personal insights, Deborah’s U.S. Civil Rights Trail guide is the perfect companion for a journey along the Trail. Her book enhances the experience of the movement and it offers a deeper dive into an important time in America’s history."
    World Footprints
  • "Award-winning journalist and author Deborah Douglas takes readers through an eye-opening journey in her book."
    Travel Noire
  • "While some travel guides focus on history, few do so in the level of detail as Douglas’…Douglas carefully scrutinizes source material from the movement, synthesizing facts and sharing her own impressions."
    The DePauw
  • "The book is filled with...moving moments — trials and struggles alongside triumphs and celebrations."
    Memphis Magazine
  • “The best sort of guide—one equal parts narrative, historical, and service-forward.”
    AFAR Magazine

On Sale
Jan 12, 2021
Page Count
544 pages
Publisher
Moon Travel
ISBN-13
9781640499157

Deborah D. Douglas

About the Author

Deborah Douglas is an award-winning journalist, cultural critic, and thought leader specializing in the African American lived experience.
Deborah lives in Chicago, where she was born, but is a self-described product of the Great Migration: She started school in post-uprising Detroit and came of age in metro Memphis. After graduating from Northwestern University, she traveled the country as a reporter, landing in Jackson, Mississippi. She’s taught best practices to journalists in Karachi, Pakistan, taught in South Africa twice, studied HIV and malaria prevention in Tanzania, and traveled to Kenya, Tunisia, and Senegal, and throughout Europe. She is currently the Eugene S. Pulliam Distinguished Visiting Professor at DePauw University, creating courses to show student-journalists how to center marginalized voices in their work.
She served as the managing editor of MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, a reporting project examining the economic realities of Memphis, Tennessee, 50+ years since Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated there. Previously, she was the No. 2 at the Chicago Sun-Times editorial page and a columnist. She served as an adjunct lecturer at Medill where she designed a Civil Rights Act of 1964 graduate capstone, and has contributed to VICE, Time, American Prospect, The Root, The Grio and The (NAACP) Crisis magazine. She is a senior leader at The OpEd Project, an initiative that amplifies underrepresented expert voices. In her career, she’s had the honor of speaking with civil rights icons, including Rev. Jesse Jackson, Rev. James Lawson, Diane Nash, Bernard Lafayette, Bree Newsome, Rev. Bernice King, and Rev. Martin King III. Her work has been cited by the New York Times, and she’s won numerous awards for her writing for Oprah magazine and other outlets.

Learn more about this author