Hey, it's NPR's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbong. There's that meme that goes like,

I really wish I wasn't living through a major historical event right now. And I get the sentiment.

There are years that feel like everything is happening all at once. Take 1963. That year is

the subject of the new book by scholar Peneal Joseph titled Freedom Season,

how 1963 transformed America's Civil Rights Revolution. And then he argues that the events

of that year paved the way for the next 50 years of American history. He talks to hearing

now Scott Tong about what the public reaction was like to all these historical events happening

around them. That's coming up.

1963 was a watershed year in the civil rights struggle, widespread protests on streets and

at lunch counters, and violent responses to those protests. Children killed in a church bombing.

Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his

I have a dream speech at the March in Washington, and President Kennedy and his brother,

the Attorney General Bobby Kennedy, pushed Congress to take action. And then, of course,

the president was assassinated in November of 1963. In the end, the turmoil of that year did bring change new laws on civil rights

and on voting rights. Paneal Joseph writes about this in his new book, Freedom Season, on

1963, transformed America's civil rights revolution. He's a professor at the University of Texas

Austin and founder of its Center for Race and Democracy.

Poneel Joseph, welcome back.

It's great to be here, Scott.

Before going into the key moments of 1963, which you read about it, I'd like you to distill your

main argument, if you would.

Why, in your view, was 1963 the year that transformed the civil rights movement?

...