Independent Scholar Examines Cotton and Race in Book: JACKSON, Miss. - Gene Dattel grew up in the segregated South and was one of the few Mississippians enrolled at Yale University in 1962 when his home state became ensnared in a bloody confrontation over integration.
More than 1,200 miles and a cultural universe away from the land of cotton, the White freshman found himself answering questions about the violent resistance to James Meredith's court-ordered admission as the first Black student at the University of Mississippi.
'I was really put on the defensive,' Dattel, now 65 and living in New York, recalled recently.
He said his struggle to answer questions, and to understand what led to events of the day, prompted him to begin an intense course of study. He earned a bachelor's degree in history from Yale in 1966 and a law degree from Vanderbilt University in 1969.
