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Testimonials About the BOOk
When we think of history, we usually imagine people and events with national significance—political leaders, social movements, changes in culture. But most people’s lives revolve around more familiar, yet no less important, concerns: work, faith, family, and friends—all the things that give our lives meaning and shape our memories.
Dr. King, The Rabbi, and Me describes both these worlds, through a young teenager’s diary written between April, 1963, and May, 1964—a momentous time that saw Martin Luther King’s March on Washington, the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church, the assassination of President Kennedy…and the first U.S. appearance of The Beatles. Carol-Anne’s diary describes her encounters with these events, on television and radio, in Time magazine, and through discussions with her family, teachers, and peers. But it also describes a world familiar to any young person growing up, as she makes and loses friends, takes part in family celebrations, accepts new responsibilities, and tries to find her place in the world.
Most importantly, the diary reveals a young person’s attempt to understand national events from her own comfortable and relatively privileged position. She strives to make sense of the lives of people whose background and experiences differ from her own, the obstacles they face and their efforts to overcome them, and the indifference some people feel toward those struggles. These two worlds come together in the book’s climax, as the 14-year-old Carol-Anne is brought face-to-face with one of the 20th century’s most inspiring leaders.
Keith C. Barton
Professor of Curriculum and Instruction,
Adjunct Professor of History,
Indiana University, Bloomington, IN
This book, Dr. King, The Rabbi, and Me: A Connecticut Journey, is a story that offers an unusual historical rendering of the Civil Rights’ rallies, speeches, news articles and television reporting by Walter Cronkite—as seen, heard and considered by a young teenage girl. The book chronicles Hossler’s understanding and commitment to what it means to be “civil” and to have equal rights and responsibilities.
Lynne Boyle-Baise
Professor Emeritus,
Indiana University, Bloomington, IN
Carol-Anne Hughes Hossler has written a groundbreaking text for youth about some of the most complicated issues and questions in our contemporary world. Exploring her own sense making and coming to see and understand race and racism, readers can confront the ways race has shaped and continues to shape so much of our contemporary experience in the United States and in the world more broadly.
Readers will find an accessible and critical book that will spur further conversations and support both youth and adults to question their own place in the maintenance of our racial status quo. By learning about Carol-Anne’s journey, readers gain a sense of the historical roots of race-based discrimination and the ways that all of us, no matter where we live or how old we are, can do something to stand against racism.
Zachary A. Casey
Assistant Professor and Associate Chair of Educational Studies,
Rhodes College, Memphis, TN
Following the story of one year of incredible growth and lifelong change is compelling and serves as an example of how one person can make sense of the world, and how one year can shape the activism of one person for decades in the future.
The story of Carol-Anne Hughes Hossler, a white girl, living her adolescence with the backdrop of the Civil Rights Movement, can challenge us all to identify the people and moments that spur us to grow, change, and use our power to work for justice in the future.
Kathryn Engebretson
Associate Professor of Curriculum and Instruction,
Indiana University, Bloomington, IN
Carol-Anne Hossler’s memoir is a tender history of an adolescent living in the Northeast in the 1960s. Her teenage life—day-to-day events at home, school, church, and with friends—becomes increasingly uncomfortable as she watches the evening news with Walter Cronkite and reads the weekly subscription of Time magazine. A pivotal time in her life is when, with the help of a Rabbi from a nearby community, she has an opportunity to meet and talk with Martin Luther King Jr.
The postscripts included are well integrated into the narrative, giving the reader a more intimate insight into what many adolescents may have felt as they attempted to make sense of their lives and the life experiences of Black Americans.
Jesus Garcia
Professor Emeritus,
University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV
The book Dr. King, The Rabbi and Me is a white, middle class teenage girl’s personal response to a critical time in the Civil Rights Movement. The book provides the reader with numerous opportunities to consider important issues of that time—issues that remain relevant today: empathy, racial awareness, equality and social justice.
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*Pat Wilson is the recipient of the 2012 Claes Nobel Educator of the Year Award (only given to two teachers in the U.S. each year); Fulbright Distinguished Awards in Teaching Program, 2014, 2015, and 2016; National Outstanding Social Studies Teacher of the Year, 2007; and the Center on Congress Outstanding Teacher of the Year, 2002.
Patricia C. Wilson
Award-winning Teacher of Social Studies,
Bloomington High School North,
Bloomington, IN
This book presents the young reader with a look at life in the early 1960s. At the same time, it is a teaching tool, a “jumping-off point” for teachers and other adults, that will prompt and promote important and challenging conversations in the classroom. Dr. King, The Rabbi, and Me enables students to develop a better understanding of the turbulence surrounding the Civil Rights Movement in comparison to today’s world, where so many of those victories and advances are taken for granted—and yet remain under threat.
Trisha Ulrich
Elementary Social Studies Classroom Teacher (retired),
Ellettsville, IN