Sign My Name to Freedom

A Memoir of a Pioneering Life

In Betty Reid Soskin's 96 years of living, she has been a witness to a grand sweep of American history. When she was born in 1921, the lynching of African-Americans was a national disgrace, minstrel shows were the most popular American form of entertainment, women were looked at suspiciously by many for exercising their right to vote, and most African-Americans in the Deep South could not vote at all. From her great-grandmother, who had been enslaved until she was in her mid-2s, Betty heard stories of slavery and the difficult times for Black Folk that immediately followed. In her lifetime, Betty has seen the nation begin to break down its race and gender biases, watched it nearly split apart in the upheavals of the civil rights and Black Power eras, and, finally, lived long enough to witness both the election of an African-American president and the re-emergence of a militant, racist far right. But far more than being merely a witness, Betty Reid Soskin has been an active participant with so many other Americans in shaping the country as we know it now. The child of Louisiana Creole parents who refused to bow down to Southern discrimination, she was raised in the Black Bay Area community before the great westward migration of World War II. After working in the civilian homefront effort in the war years, she and her husband, Mel Reid, helped break down racial boundaries by moving into a white community east of the Oakland hills. There she raised four children-one openly gay, one developmentally disabled-while working to end the prejudices against the family that existed among many of her neighbors. With Mel, she opened up one of the first Bay Area record stores in Berkeley both owned by African-Americans and dedicated to the distribution of African-American music. Her community organizing activities eventually led her to work as a state legislative aid, helping to plan the innovative Rosie the Riveter National Park in Richmond, California, then to a "second" career at the Rosie Park as the oldest park ranger in the history of the National Park Service. In between, she used her talents as a singer and songwriter to interpret and chronicle the great social upheavals that marked the 196s. In 23, Betty displayed a new talent, writing, when she created the popular blog CBreaux Speaks. Now followed by thousands, her blog is a collection of Betty's sometimes fierce, sometimes gently persuasive, but always brightly honest story that weaves both the wisdom of the ages and the fresh enthusiasm of an always youthful mind into her long journey through an American and African-American life, as well as America's long struggle to both understand and cleanse its soul. Blending together selections from many of Betty's hundreds of blog entries with interviews, letters, and speeches collected throughout her long life, Sign My Name to Freedom invites readers into an American life through the words and thoughts of a national treasure who has never stopped looking at herself, the nation, or the world with fresh eyes.

Thought provoking!

Loved listening to Betty tell her story and our story as a nation!
Fabulous

Betty Reid Soskin's life and career, in her own words

This excellent, well-written and engrossing audiobook should be required reading for those who seek truth about African-American history, if there are any such people left in the now-benighted and degraded USA. The author pulls no punches about her opinion of "the land of the free" and she is more right nowadays than she was when she wrote this memoir. Though she ends her story during the hopeful Obama era, today as I read it our country has fallen back to the dark ages with a malevolent despot destroying far too much of what used to be good about America. Soon the US will truly be a shit-hole nation, deservedly hated by every other country, no matter its politics. Betty is 103 now and I hope she lives to see better times.

Excellent Historical Account

The author reads her own words and gives a first person account of life during the 96 years she had lived prior to working this book. Jim Crow, the US military slavery, Louisiana Creole, Presidential honoree, and even being attacked by a burglar are only a few of the areas she covers.

A life well lived and continuing

I enjoyed the book immensely. It was a wonderful civil rights history by one who lived it.

There are many layers of her story

There are so many layers to Miss Betty in this story. Miss Betty is reading her own book, who could have read better she reads it so elegantly . I felt She was telling bits and pieces of my story,