| Airlift to America: How Barack Obama, Sr., John F. Kennedy, Tom Mboya, and 800 East African Students Changed Their World and Ours Contributor(s): Shachtman, Tom (Author) |
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ISBN: 0312570759 ISBN-13: 9780312570750 Publisher: St. Martin's Press OUR PRICE: $32.39 Product Type: Hardcover - Other Formats Published: September 2009 |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - History | United States - 20th Century - History | Africa - East - Education | History |
| Dewey: 378.198 |
| LCCN: 2009013186 |
| Physical Information: 1.1" H x 5.8" W x 8.6" (1.05 lbs) 288 pages |
| Themes: - Chronological Period - 1950's - Chronological Period - 1960's - Cultural Region - East Africa - Chronological Period - 20th Century |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: This is the long-hidden saga of how a handful of Americans and East Africans fought the British colonial government, the U.S. State Department, and segregation to transport to, or support at, U.S. and Canadian universities, between 1959 and 1963, nearly 800 young East African men and women who would go on to change their world and ours. The students supported included Barack Obama Sr., future father of a U.S. president, Wangari Maathai, future Nobel Peace Prize laureate, as well as the nation-builders of post-colonial East Africa -- cabinet ministers, ambassadors, university chancellors, clinic and school founders. The airlift was conceived by the unusual partnership of the charismatic, later-assassinated Kenyan Tom Mboya and William X. Scheinman, a young American entrepreneur, with supporting roles played by Jackie Robinson, Harry Belafonte, Sidney Poitier, and Martin Luther King, Jr. The airlift even had an impact on the 1960 presidential race, as Vice-President Richard Nixon tried to muscle the State Department into funding the project to prevent Senator Jack Kennedy from using his family foundation to do so and reaping the political benefit. The book is based on the files of the airlift's sponsor, the African American Students Foundation, untouched for almost fifty years. |
Contributor Bio(s): Shachtman, Tom: - Tom Shachtman is an author, filmmaker, and educator. He has written or co-authored more than thirty books, including Rumspringa, Airlift to America, and Terrors and Marvels, as well documentaries for ABC, CBS, NBC, and PBS, and has taught at major universities. Publishers Weekly lauded his book Rumspringa: To Be or Not to Be Amish as "not only one of the most absorbing books ever written about the Plain People, but a perceptive snapshot of the larger culture in which they live and move." He has written articles for The New York Times, Newsday, Smithsonian, and environmental monthlies, and writes a column for The Lakeville Journal (CT). A two-hour television documentary based on his book Absolute Zero and the Conquest of Cold was broadcast on PBS in February 2008. |