I spent the summer of 1964 traveling through Mississippi wrtiting and photographing for my Scholar of the House senior year project at Yale. I arrived in Jackson the morning after Goodman, Chaney, and Schwerner disappeared, and left the day after their bodies were found.

The title of the project, “And I Said No Lord,” comes from a conversation with a woman in Vicksburg:

“And I dreamed I saw armies and planes and tanks comin towards me across the field back there where I planted the corn and tomatoes last spring, and the planes were flyin low over the field and they dropped their bombs and the army exploded and the tanks exploded, and the corn and tomatoes I planted last year weren’t there any more, just the blowed-up tanks and the dead men that were in the army, and then I saw floatin across the field the Lord Jesus Christ all dressed in white with his arms open callin me, and with him was a whole army of saved black men all in robes but they didn’t have no heads at all, and I screamed I know cause my man shook me and woke me up and said, ‘Woman, what you screamin about?’ and I said, ‘I just seen the Lord Jesus Christ comin across the field out in back and he was all dressed in white and his eyes were sayin to me, ’Sister, you are saved, you are saved,‘ and all us black folk were with him floatin across the field with no heads and below them were all the tanks that were blowed up from the bombs and all the dead men and the planes were flyin overhead,’ and he said to me, ‘Woman, you just had a bad dream,’ and I said, ‘No, Lord, sure as I am born I saw the Lord Jesus Christ and he told me I was saved.’”