TOPIC: Inherit the Land; Jim Crow Meets Miss Maggie’s Will

SPEAKER: Gene Stowe, Author

Two antebellum white spinster sisters in Marvin, NC, raised a black man and then his daughter as their own beginning in Reconstruction.

The women left them their 800 acre homeplace, a will upheld against all odds by two White juries in Monroe in the 1920’s. The personal relationships and economic empowerment left Marvin untouched by Jim Crow to this day.

BIOGRAPHY

• Graduated from Monroe High School 1972
• UNC (religion) 1975
• Lutheran Theological Seminary (MTS) 1983
• Reporter for the Charlotte Observer 1981-1993
• Teacher, head of writing and religion program for Trinity Schools Inc. in South Bend, IN 1993-2012
• Freelance writer 2013 to present