A story about what it cost to do the right thing — and what it took to be forgiven for not doing it.

Greg Wittkamper grew up at Koinonia Farm, where racial equality was not a political position but a way of life. When he arrived at Americus High School in 1964, he refused to join his classmates in tormenting the school's first Black students. For that, he was treated nearly as badly as they were — harassed, beaten, and isolated. After graduation, he left Georgia and didn't look back.

Forty-one years later, a dozen former classmates wrote to ask his forgiveness.

The Class of '65 follows Greg's return to Americus and the stories of four classmates who spent decades reckoning with what they had done — and not done — during those years. Author Jim Auchmutey traces how ordinary people, shaped by a culture of segregation, found their way toward something better. It is not a triumphant story. It is an honest one.

For anyone who has wondered whether people can really change — and what it takes — this book offers a careful, hopeful answer.

Details:

• Paperback
• 278 pages