A Fire You Can't Put Out: The Civil Rights Life of Birmingham's Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth (Religion and American Culture). Hardbound - 1999

Tuscaloosa, Alabama:: University of Alabama Press, 1999.. 2nd Printing.. Hardbound . BINDING/CONDITION: red binding; a Fine book, with a Fine dust jacket.. 8vo (9.25 inches tall) . Notes, bibliography, index. Description: Includes a chronology and a section of photographs. The publisher's blurb reads: '''When Fred Shuttlesworth suffered only a bump on the head in the 1956 bombing of his home, members of his church called it a miracle. Shuttlesworth took it as a sign that God would protect him on the mission that had made him a target that night. Standing in front of his demolished home, Shuttlesworth vigorously renewed his commitment to integrate Birmingham's buses, lunch counters, police force, and parks. The incident transformed him, in the eyes of Birmingham blacks, from an up-and-coming young minister to a virtual folk hero and, in the view of white Birmingham, from obscurity to rabble-rouser extraordinaire. Author Andrew M Manis argues that, during a ministry that extended beyond Birmingham and into the 1990s, Shuttlesworth displayed in undiluted form the fiery, combative spirituality of African American religion. Throughout the book, Manis emphasizes Shuttlesworth's dual role as pastor and civil rights leader, stressing Shuttlesworth's understanding of his responsibility as a Christian minister as the driving force behind his civil rights activism.''