Bob Thomas,
Rabun Gap, GA.

I have been working on a web site for the Lillian E. Smith Foundation located in Rabun County, Georgia. In doing research for the project I'm learning more and more about a remarkable woman who as a Southerner spoke out frankly and with unflinching certainty against segregation. As an author she used her talents to write many works, both fiction and non fiction, exposing the devastating effects on both blacks and whites. While the damage to and disdain for African Americans could not be hidden but could be ignored, whites were destroying themselves by using oppression and hatred to control others. Lillian Smith did not ease herself into the civil rights movement she threw herself headlong into it with the power of her words and deeds. She is a role model of courage and humanity not only for her work in the civil rights movement but that she rose above the affects of severe illness to continue that work. I am proud and humbled to have her life touch mine.