Dreaming in the Delta

Abstract

In 1990, in Indianola, Mississippi, there was a catfish-processing plant owned by 178 White male farmers. The workforce inside the plant was ninety percent Black and female. Led by an ordinary working mother turned union organizer named Sarah White, the women at Delta Pride led the largest strike of Black laborers ever to take place in that state, and won. Kristal Brent Zook, an award-winning journalist, traveled to Indianola to meet with White and others in an effort to understand the plight of working class women in the modern-day South. What she found there taught her as much about herself, as it did about human rights and dignity in America today.