John Egerton

Who was John Egerton?

John Egerton was an American journalist and author known for his writing on the Civil Rights movement, Southern food, history of the South, and Southern culture.

Egerton wrote or edited approximately twenty non-fiction books and one "contemporary fable". He also contributed chapters to numerous other volumes and wrote scores of articles in newspapers and magazines. Egerton was a participant and writer for many projects and conferences dealing with education, desegregation, civil rights, and the American South; particularly its food. Among his best-known books are "The Americanization of Dixie", "Generations: An American Family", "Southern Food: At Home, on the Road, in History", and "Speak Now Against the Day: The Generation before the Civil Rights Movement in the South". Egerton died on November 21, 2013.

Egerton's Speak Now Against the Day: The Generation Before the Civil Rights Movement in the South won the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award. He also wrote Southern Food: At Home, On the Road, In History and coedited Nashville: An American Self-Portrait, a look at his adopted city to in the 1960s.