The color of water

Essay by badal09College, UndergraduateA, May 2004

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In the book The Color of Water, Miss Ruth Mc Bride Jordan had a relationship at the age of fifteen. Her relationship had occurred in the 1930's in Virginia. At that time, anti-miscegenation laws were in force. Miss Jordan's boyfriend was Peter, who was black. The relationship went against the laws of anti-miscegenation, since she was white and her boyfriend was black. Therefore, the relationships between different races were illegal and dangerous at that time. Miss Jordan had an abortion when she got pregnant. She couldn't get married because it was against the law. There was also the Ku Klux Klan, which was a racist group that was against interracial marriages.

In the book The Color of Water, Miss Ruth Mc Bride married two black men. The first one that she got married to was Rev. Andrew D. Mc Bride. At that time, she had left Virginia in 1941 and was living in New York.

When her first husband died, she married Hunter Jordan, Sr., who was another black man. Those two marriages took place in New York; a state that had no laws pertaining to miscegenation. Therefore, interracial marriages were legal in New York.

Miss Jordan's children were not completely white. They were mixed; either light brown, dark brown, or white. That occurred because the mother was white and both husbands were black. Those twelve children grew up in a black community. The children were involved ion the music, the Civil Rights Movement and other influences of the black culture. In the book The Color of Water, the author was not certain if he was white or black, because his mother was white and his father was black. His curiosity grew in his childhood days.

Anti- miscegenation was said to be a kind of Endangered Persons...