Booknotes: Yes, Lord, I Know the Road

New Arrival:
• Yes, Lord, I Know the Road: A Documentary History of African Americans in South Carolina, 1526-2008 edited by J. Brent Morris (Univ of S Carolina Pr, 2017).

"Yes, Lord, I Know the Road is the first comprehensive history of African Americans in the Palmetto State." Its collected documents span the "first North American slave rebellion near the mouth of the Pee Dee River in the early sixteenth century" through Barack Obama's 2008 victory in the state's Democratic primary.

Editor J. Brent Morris contributes a general introduction and his selections assembled together "a wide variety of annotated primary-source documents―personal narratives, government reports, statutes, newspaper articles, and speeches―to highlight the significant people, events, social and political movements, and ideas that have shaped black life in South Carolina and beyond." Many of the documents are published here for the first time, and many others have been previously published but difficult to find.

The resources are presented in the typical manner of documentary histories, with the material organized by theme and with brief introductory comments for each item. Notes and an index are in the back.