Resisting Jim Crow: The Autobiography of Dr. John A. McFall

Presented by Lahnice McFall Hollister

“Injustice… is a cancer that is rapidly eating into the vitals of our nation.” A newspaper reported Dr. John A. McFall’s words at an annual program on race relations at a Charleston church in 1936. The details of how Dr. McFall and many thousands experienced the transition to Jim Crow in Charleston is vividly told in the book Resisting Jim Crow: The Autobiography of Dr. John A. McFall. Found in the Fisk University Library—the manuscript was not originally intended for publication. Dr. McFall’s grandniece, Lahnice Hollister, edited and published it in 2021 because “few African-American voices tell our lived history.”

Dr. McFall’s life spanned the years between the end of Reconstruction in 1878 and the Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954. McFall’s emancipated parents had hoped for both freedom and equality for themselves and their children. Instead, generations faced white supremacy and legalized segregation.

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