I haven’t been in Fulton, Kentucky, for more than 30 years. It’s very likely a pretty nice town. Even then, in July 1966, the night of the unpleasantness, there were at least three mighty fine people living there. That’s how we managed to get out with no more physical damage than a few bumps and bruises. And of course, a ruined truck.

Three or four years ago, a black college official at Wayne State U. in Detroit, a mostly black town, startled me by saying, “I know one thing: The world has always been divided into black people and white people, and it always will be.” … (2001.4.7)