SKILLS - High School -- LawWorks

Gordon D. Schaber High School Law Program Kick-Off Luncheon Highlights

Community Citizenship Award

EVA RUTLAND

Eva Rutland is the author of more than 20 novels and winner of the 2000 Golden Pen Award for Lifetime Achievement. On her website, Ms. Rutland states that she “was born in Atlanta Georgia during the olden days, when pot was a cooking utensil, webs were for spiders and civil rights were for white folks.”

The granddaughter of a slave, she was born and raised in Atlanta, Georgia, by a school-teacher mother and pharmacist father. She attended segregated schools all her life, and finished at Spelman, the black woman’s college, in 1937. After World War II, she and her husband, Bill Rutland, headed west to Sacramento, California, where they raised four children and where she still lives today.

Of her book “When We Were Colored, A Mother’s Story,’ first published in 1964, Eva has said, she “wanted all mothers to know that my black children were just like their white children; filled with all the joys, and insecurities of childhood, just as precious and just as fragile. I think my story is as relevant today as it was when I wrote it. It goes beyond black and white. It’s really about the fears that all mothers face as we struggle to raise healthy, happy, productive children.”

Indeed, this book does remain as relevant today as it was during the height of our nation's still-unfinished struggle to secure liberty, justice and equality for all.
In addition, Ms. Rutland, along with her daughter, Ginger Rutland, and grandson John Hooper, have established IWP – Isaac Westmoreland Publishing, an effort which extends the legacy of Eva Rutland’s grandfather, Isaac Westmoreland. Born a slave, Isaac was freed after the Civil War and built a home and a thriving boot making business in Atlanta, Georgia before the dawn of the 20th century.

Today, IWP’s pledge is to publish books that will bring readers a lift, some laughter and a love for each other. They also pledge to publish books of substance, books that expose injustice, that defend the weak and the dispossessed and that celebrate the qualities that Isaac Westmoreland embodied - courage, perseverance, hard work and justice.

Copyright ©2003. Center for Youth Citizenship. All rights reserved.
Mailing Address: P.O. Box 269003, Sacramento, CA 95826-9003
Physical Address: 10170 Missile Way, Mather, CA 95655
(916) 228-2322 . Fax (916) 228-2493 . cyc@scoe.net