Baldwin traveled south in 1957 on Philip Rahv’s suggestion

Evidence

Her photo was not the reason he decided to leave Paris. But when Baldwin finally went to the South in 1957 at the suggestion of Partisan Review’s Philip Rahv, he found Dot’s story. He arrived in Charlotte in the fall, after she had withdrawn from Harding High School. A woman, he reported, told him of the mob and of the spit that dripped from the hem of Dorothy’s dress. Several white students, he was told, begged Dot to stay. — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Begin Again, 168

Categorization

• SHARE: The detail of spit dripping from Dorothy Counts’ dress hem is a striking image a friend into civil-rights history would appreciate.