About the author
Dr. Marvel Lang is a Professor of Urban Studies at Michigan state University in East Lansing, Michigan where he has been employed since 1986. He grew up in rural southeast Mississippi on a farm five miles outside the small town of Bay Springs in Jasper County. His formative years were in the late 1950's and early 1960's when the Civil Rights Movement was at its peak in the South. His father, Otha Lang, Sr., was his hero although he lived in constant fear that the Ku Klux Klan would be coming to kill him because he would not bow or conform to the Jim Crow system but stood up and demanded the respect due him as a man. This volume is a testament to the life of Otha Lang, Sr.
Dr. Lang received his undergraduate degree at Jackson State University in 1970 with high honor; the M.A. at the University of Pittsburgh in 1975; and the Ph.D. at Michigan State University in 1979. He was president of the senior class at Jackson State in 1970 when the two students were massacred by state troopers just a few days after the Kent State massacre. He was previously a faculty member at Jackson State and also worked at the U.S. Census Bureau in Washington, D.C. as a professional researcher. He has written and published extensiverly on several topics. Dr. Lang's book "Gone To Hell This Morning" is a must read book!