History books record August 28, 1963, as the day when over a quarter-million people rallied in Washington, in the first-ever nationally televised demonstration�when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered his iconic "I Have a Dream" oration. But as Charles Euchner reveals in Nobody Turn Me Around, the march�s significance is more surprising and complex than standard treatments allow.

With rich oral histories from over one hundred participants�high-profile civil rights leaders but also ordinary Americans, like the marcher who won a train ticket after enduring a brutal jailing�Euchner offers a vivid tale of that day. Nobody Turn Me Around shows the movement at its apex, on the verge of achieving historic reform�and decline. The book shows James Farmer watching the march from his jail cell; Malcolm X�s secret vow to help the march, while mocking it from the sidelines; how King really wrote his landmark address; the controversy over John Lewis�s damning speech; and devastating undercurrents involving JFK and J. Edgar Hoover. Each scene comes alive in this richly intimate account of the peak of the civil rights era.