Students read historical novel set in 1950s South

Some of our ESL students have been reading the historical novel Lay That Trumpet in Our Hands in their UNS 100 classes this semester. The book is based on real events that included murders of African Americans by the Ku Klux Klan in Florida during the 1950s, as the Civil Rights Movement was beginning.

Susan Carol McCarthy, the author of the book, and Evangeline Moore, the daughter of Harry T. Moore, a Civil Rights leader who appears in the book, spoke at Finlandia at the beginning of the fall semester. They talked about how some of the tragic events of the book affected their respective families.

Evangeline Moore speaks to Finlandia students about the events of the novel Lay That Trumpet in Our Hands and how they affected her family. The author of the novel, Susan Carol McCarthy, seated, also spoke about how she came to write the book when she learned about her own father's efforts to obtain justice for Klan victims.

The book was chosen for Michigan Tech University's Reading as Inquiry summer reading program for first-year students. Finlandia's first-year students read the book during the fall semester and benefited from the opportunity to meet the author and Ms. Moore and to hear their stories.

Last year Finlandia students participated in this same reading program with the book Three Cups of Tea and heard author Greg Mortenson speak about his work building schools, especially for girls, in Pakistan and Afghanistan.