My Father and Atticus Finch: A Lawyer's Fight for Justice in 1930s Alabama
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The story of Foster Beck, the author's late father, whose defense of a black man accused of rape in 1930s Alabama foreshadowed the trial at the heart of To Kill a Mockingbird.
As a child, Joseph Beck heard the stories—when other lawyers came up with excuses, his father courageously defended a black man charged with raping a white woman.
Now a lawyer himself, Beck reconstructs his father's role in State of Alabama vs. Charles White, Alias, a trial that was much publicized when Harper Lee was twelve years old.
On the day of Foster Beck's client's arrest, the leading local newspaper reported, under a page-one headline, that "a wandering negro fortune teller giving the name Charles White" had "volunteered a detailed confession of the attack" of a local white girl. However, Foster Beck concluded that the confession was coerced. The same article claimed that "the negro accomplished his dastardly purpose," but as in To Kill a Mockingbird, there was evidence at the trial to the contrary. Throughout the proceedings, the defendant had to be escorted from the courthouse to a distant prison "for safekeeping," and the courthouse itself was surrounded by a detachment of sixteen Alabama highway patrolmen.
The saga captivated the community with its dramatic testimonies and emotional outcome. It would take an immense toll on those involved, including Foster Beck, who worried that his reputation had cast a shadow over his lively, intelligent, and supportive fiancé, Bertha, who had her own social battles to fight.
This riveting memoir, steeped in time and place, seeks to understand how race relations, class, and the memory of southern defeat in the Civil War produced such a haunting distortion of justice, and how it may figure into our literary imagination.
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Joseph Madison Beck. (2016). My Father and Atticus Finch: A Lawyer's Fight for Justice in 1930s Alabama. W. W. Norton & Company.
Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation (style guide)Joseph Madison Beck. 2016. My Father and Atticus Finch: A Lawyer's Fight for Justice in 1930s Alabama. W. W. Norton & Company.
Chicago / Turabian - Humanities Citation (style guide)Joseph Madison Beck, My Father and Atticus Finch: A Lawyer's Fight for Justice in 1930s Alabama. W. W. Norton & Company, 2016.
MLA Citation (style guide)Joseph Madison Beck. My Father and Atticus Finch: A Lawyer's Fight for Justice in 1930s Alabama. W. W. Norton & Company, 2016.
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The story of Foster Beck, the author's late father, whose defense of a black man accused of rape in 1930s Alabama foreshadowed the trial at the heart of To Kill a Mockingbird.
As a child, Joseph Beck heard the stories—when other lawyers came up with excuses, his father courageously defended a black man charged with raping a white woman.
Now a lawyer himself, Beck reconstructs his father's role in State of Alabama vs. Charles White, Alias, a trial that was much publicized when Harper Lee was twelve years old.
On the day of Foster Beck's client's arrest, the leading local newspaper reported, under a page-one headline, that "a wandering negro fortune teller giving the name Charles White" had "volunteered a detailed confession of the attack" of a local white girl. However, Foster Beck concluded that the confession was coerced. The same article claimed that "the negro accomplished his dastardly purpose," but as in To Kill a Mockingbird, there was evidence at the trial to the contrary. Throughout the proceedings, the defendant had to be escorted from the courthouse to a distant prison "for safekeeping," and the courthouse itself was surrounded by a detachment of sixteen Alabama highway patrolmen.
The saga captivated the community with its dramatic testimonies and emotional outcome. It would take an immense toll on those involved, including Foster Beck, who worried that his reputation had cast a shadow over his lively, intelligent, and supportive fiancé, Bertha, who had her own social battles to fight.
This riveting memoir, steeped in time and place, seeks to understand how race relations, class, and the memory of southern defeat in the Civil War produced such a haunting distortion of justice, and how it may figure into our literary imagination.
- reviews
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April 4, 2016
With the recent publication of Go Set a Watchman and subsequent death of Harper Lee, Beck’s memoir about his father, Foster, an Alabama lawyer who he speculates helped inspire To Kill a Mockingbird, is especially timely. Foster was still at the start of his career when, in 1938, a judge picked him to defend Charles White, an African-American man accused of rape. Many were not happy to have a white lawyer represent a black defendant quite so vigorously. Beck’s suspenseful recreation of the trial is gripping, far more so than his well-intentioned but sometimes clumsy examination of race in the Depression-era South. Beck also provides a fond record of his parents’ memories of their courtship, which coincided with this tumultuous time in Foster’s career. But the book never quite knows what it wants to be; it is a blurry, somewhat disconcerting mix of fact and fiction (in the form of recreated dialogue). Beck, a lawyer himself, feels great pride in his father’s bravery, and declares Atticus Finch and Foster “birds of a feather” even though Lee denied any recollection of the case. It is certainly an interesting story, but his telling of it lacks the distance that might have made this book more cohesive.
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April 15, 2016
A distinguished Atlanta attorney remembers his lawyer father, who defended a black man against charges that he raped a white woman in pre-civil rights era Alabama. As a young adult, Beck was struck by the similarities between his father and Atticus Finch, the main character of Harper Lee's classic 1960 novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. Like Finch, Foster Beck was "idealistic [and] reverent about the Constitution." His clients included sharecroppers and farmers whom he defended against banks and who mostly compensated him in produce rather than "cash money." Yet Foster was satisfied because he was following his conscience. When a judge called upon him to defend Charles White, a black man accused of interracial sexual assault, Foster accepted. He believed that future clients would view the fact that he had taken a difficult case--which he believed he could win--as proof of his worth as a lawyer. But Foster soon saw just how tough the case would be. Unlike other blacks he had defended, White was intimidating and demanding. Claiming he was innocent, White refused Foster's efforts to find a solution because he would not compromise with a racist judicial system determined to send him to the electric chair. Foster found evidence that the woman White had allegedly raped was an uninjured virgin. But he still lost the case as well as the appeal that followed. Not long afterward, he lost his struggling practice as well. Beck's claim that the highly publicized White trial may have influenced the young Harper Lee is as fascinating as it is plausible, especially given the striking similarities he notes between his father and Atticus Finch. Yet it is ultimately the generosity of spirit that infuses Beck's recollections that is the most moving part of this memorable story. A poignant and warmly engaging memoir.COPYRIGHT(2016) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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June 1, 2016
Beck does not presume to say his father inspired the character of Atticus Finch. But, as he explains in this engrossing memoir, Foster Beck faced a challenging case as a small-town lawyer in 1930s Alabama that fell along deeply drawn racial lines. Just starting out in his career, Foster was cajoled into defending a black man accused of raping a young white woman. As a lawyer himself, author Beck lays out the circumstances of the case with gripping, almost cinematic detail mustered from court documents, newspaper articles, family papers, and conversations. The case and the context of social and racial relations that surrounded it deservedly make up the bulk of the book. Harper Lee herself responded to Beck's inquiry about whether she remembered this particular trial to say she didn't recall it. However, even if Foster's work didn't play a role in the creation of To Kill a Mockingbird, it remains a fascinating example of the persistent prejudices and stunning obstacles that those working for justice without regard to color faced in the Depression era and beyond.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)
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May 1, 2016
This title is not about the parallels between the author's father and the popular character of Atticus Finch in Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird. Rather, it is an insightful window into the everyday life of small-town Alabama in the 1930s. Beck's father, Foster Beck, was the defense attorney for Charles White, a black man accused of raping a white woman. White maintained his innocence, much like the accused Tom Robinson in Lee's classic. Beck's brief chronicle looks into this time in his father's life, and how it helped form the person the author is now. Reportedly, novelist Lee did not know about the White case. Beck describes the circumstances of the trial, focusing on his family's history of confronting racism in the South. Ultimately, the similarities between the cases are more coincidental than anything else, but the characters in this true story are no less fascinating. VERDICT A sad but gripping account, this book will initially hook readers with the potential connection to Lee's novel, but they'll stay for the description of society in a bygone era. For fans of true crime, To Kill a Mockingbird, and John Berendt's Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. [See Prepub Alert, 12/7/15.]--Ryan Claringbole, Wisconsin Dept. of Pub. Instruction, Madison
Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
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Starred review from May 1, 2016
This title is not about the parallels between the author's father and the popular character of Atticus Finch in Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird. Rather, it is an insightful window into the everyday life of small-town Alabama in the 1930s. Beck's father, Foster Beck, was the defense attorney for Charles White, a black man accused of raping a white woman. White maintained his innocence, much like the accused Tom Robinson in Lee's classic. Beck's brief chronicle looks into this time in his father's life, and how it helped form the person the author is now. Reportedly, novelist Lee did not know about the White case. Beck describes the circumstances of the trial, focusing on his family's history of confronting racism in the South. Ultimately, the similarities between the cases are more coincidental than anything else, but the characters in this true story are no less fascinating. VERDICT A sad but gripping account, this book will initially hook readers with the potential connection to Lee's novel, but they'll stay for the description of society in a bygone era. For fans of true crime, To Kill a Mockingbird, and John Berendt's Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. [See Prepub Alert, 12/7/15.]--Ryan Claringbole, Wisconsin Dept. of Pub. Instruction, Madison
Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
- premium: True
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January 1, 2016
In 1930s Alabama, the author's father defied convention by defending a black man accused of raping a white woman, and it appears that Harper Lee knew about the high-profile trial--she even wrote the author a letter. Amazing timing.
Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
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The story of Foster Beck, the author's late father, whose defense of a black man accused of rape in 1930s Alabama foreshadowed the trial at the heart of To Kill a Mockingbird.
As a child, Joseph Beck heard the stories—when other lawyers came up with excuses, his father courageously defended a black man charged with raping a white woman.
Now a lawyer himself, Beck reconstructs his father's role in State of Alabama vs. Charles White, Alias, a trial that was much publicized when Harper Lee was twelve years old.
On the day of Foster Beck's client's arrest, the leading local newspaper reported, under a page-one headline, that "a wandering negro fortune teller giving the name Charles White" had "volunteered a detailed confession of the attack" of a local white girl. However, Foster Beck concluded that the confession was coerced. The same article claimed that "the negro accomplished his dastardly purpose," but as in To Kill a Mockingbird,...
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