Isabel Wilkerson Captivates Audiences in Denver

Isabel Wilkerson, author of The Warmth of Other Suns and the first African American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize, spoke to a standing room-only audience at Manual High School in Denver, Colorado, this week as part of the Facing History and Ourselves Community Conversation series in partnership with The Allstate Foundation.

Wilkerson’s bestselling account chronicles the history of the Great Migration, when six million African American families fled the American South over the course of the 20th century, resettling in the North and West.

The crowd of 900 gave the former New York Times correspondent and current director of the narrative nonfiction program at Boston University a standing ovation before she even began to speak. Included in the audience were 38 middle school students from the nearby Excel Institute, as well as some living participants of the Great Migration.

“We have the responsibility to make their sacrifice mean something,” Wilkerson told the crowd.

Read Tina Griego’s op-ed “Indelible Stamp of Migration” in the Denver Post.

Read “A conversation with Pulitzer Winner Isabel Wilkerson” by Joanne Davidson and view pictures from the event in the Denver Post.

Read an interview with Isabel Wilkerson on the Facing History website.

Learn more about our work in Denver and Rocky Mountain States.