Darlington County, South Carolina, to his death at the age of seventy-four. Along that journey Newman led the state's African Americans to join the Democratic Party and was a delegate to several Democratic Presidential Conventions. In 1983 he became the first African American South Carolinian elected to the State Senate in nearly a century. The Spirit of an Activist is essentially biographical, but it uses a diverse chorus of voices to capture Newman's rich and varied contributions in transforming South Carolina's rigid and unjust social systems. His quiet dignity and appeals to reason won him the confidence, and ultimately the support, of key white political and economic leaders. In effect Newman served both as chief strategist for the protest movement and as chief negotiator at the conference table, becoming the "unofficial liaison" between South Carolina's African American citizens and the state's white power structure. In the years that followed formal desegregation, Newman remained active in politics and became a trusted confidant of state leaders, many of whom are featured in this volume. The Spirit of an Activist includes a foreword by attorney and civil rights activist Vernon E. Jordan, Jr., and a prologue by South Carolina congressman James E. Clyburn, both personal friends of Newman who worked with him during the civil rights struggle. Contributors: Gloria Blackwell (Rackley), Tanya S. Brice, Millicent E. Brown, Wallace Brown, Sr., James E. Clyburn, G. Robert Cook, Carrie Crawford Washington, Donald L. Fowler, Karen Ross Grant, Vernon E. Jordan, Jr., Sadye L.M. Logan, Robert E. McNair, Josephine A. McRant, Jerome Noble, Matthew J. Perry, Jr., Harrison Reardon, Richard W. Riley, Wim Roefs, Alex Sanders, William "Bill" Saunders, Hiram Spain, Jr., James S. Thomas, Isaac "Ike" W. Williams, Esther Nell Knuckles Glymph Witherspoon"-- |