Book Talk | A Conversation with Historian Neil Kinghan - College of Charleston Libraries
Kinghan’s new book, A Brief Moment in the Sun, is the first scholarly biography of Francis Lewis Cardozo, one of the most talented and influential African Americans to hold elected office in the South between Reconstruction and the civil rights era. Born to a formerly enslaved African American mother and white Jewish father in antebellum South Carolina, Cardozo led a life of extraordinary achievement as a pioneering educator, politician, and government official. Today, however, he is largely unknown in South Carolina and among students of nineteenth-century American history.
The first complete historical analysis of Francis Cardozo and his contribution to Reconstruction and African American history, A Brief Moment in the Sun draws on original research on Cardozo’s early life and education in Scotland and England and pulls together for the first time the extant sources on his experiences in South Carolina and Washington, DC.
Kinghan reveals all that Cardozo achieved as a Black educator and political leader and explores what else he might have realized if white racism and violence had not ended his efforts in South Carolina. Above all, Kinghan shows that Francis Cardozo deserves a place of honor and distinction in the history of nineteenth-century America.
Kinghan’s presentation will be followed by an audience Q&A. Books will be available for sale and signing at the event.
