Bibliography 2: #BIB39209

Key	BIB39209
Reference type	Journal Article
Title	The Life, Faith, and Death of Helen Clevenger (1917-1936)
Journal	The Journal of the North Carolina Association of Historians
Author	Kolins, Steven
Year	2023
Date	September 2023
Volume	31
Abstract	In the third article, we return to early 20th-century North Carolina. The article “The Life, Faith and Death of Helen Clevenger, 1917-1936" by Steven Kolins, focuses on the murder of a young woman four months shy of her nineteenth birthday on her first (and last) visit to North Carolina. Newspapers across the country and even in England sensationalized Helen Clevenger’s death in Asheville in 1936, the search for her killer, and the rapid identification, trial, and execution of the African American accused, Martin Moore—only 22 years old himself. While Kolins notes that this can be framed as yet another example of the Jim Crow “justice” that characterized the South in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the irony of the case lay in Clevenger membership in the Baha'i Faith. In 1936, few Americans knew much about the Baha’i Faith and the few newspapers that commented on this aspect of Clevenger’s life often reported inaccurately. Kolins provides a history of the religion in the US, touching briefly on its origins in Persia. American Baha'is were strikingly at odds with most other mainstream religions in their resolute affirmation of human equality. The faith established roots early among African Americans in Washington, D.C. and spread to both blacks and whites in other cities as well. In 1921, the religion’s head, 'Abdu’l-Baha, asked the various congregations - all of them integrated - to begin holding “Race Amity” meetings, where members could openly discuss race and racism. That this occurred in the context of President Woodrow Wilson resegregating the capital city and the resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan outside of the former Confederate south is astonishing. Kolins documents the Clevenger family’s active membership in the group, and young Helen's likely attendance at its youth events. By so doing, he highlights the fact that state-sanctioned revenge against Moore contravened the principles by which Helen Clevenger had lived her life.
Research notes	Atachment does not reproduce the published pages.
Language	English
Keywords	CLEVENGER, HELEN; BIOGRAPHY; NORTH CAROLINA; MURDER; RACISM; MOORE, MARTIN
Pages	43–68
Legal note	11.
File attachments	internal-pdf://1308198171/Kolins, Steven, The Life, Faith, and Death of.pdf

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