Clarence King is a hero of nineteenth-century western history. Brilliant scientist and witty conversationalist, bestselling author and architect of the great surveys that mapped the West after the Civil War, King was named by John Hay "the best and brightest of his generation." But King hid a secret from his Gilded Age cohorts and prominent family in Newport: for thirteen years he lived a double life—as the celebrated white explorer, geologist, and writer Clarence King and as a black Pullman porter and steelworker named James Todd. The fair, blue-eyed son of a wealthy China trader passed across the color line, revealing his secret to his black common-law wife, Ada King, only on his deathbed. Martha A. Sandweiss, a noted historian of the American West, is the first writer to uncover the life that King tried so hard to conceal from the public eye. She reveals the complexity of a man who while publicly espousing a personal dream of a uniquely American "race," an amalgam of white and black, hid his love for his wife and their five biracial children. Passing Strange tells the dramatic tale of a family built along the fault lines of celebrity, class, and race—from the "Todd's" wedding in 1888 to the 1964 death of Ada, one of the last surviving Americans born into slavery, and finally to the legacy inherited by Clarence King's granddaughter, who married a white man and adopted a white child in order to spare her family the legacies of racism. A remarkable feat of research and reporting spanning the Civil War to the civil rights era, Passing Strange tells a uniquely American story of self-invention, love, deception, and race.
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"This book grabbed me and would not let me go! The fact that a socially and historically prominent man could maintain two different lives separate from each other is amazing! Sandweiss does a great job of adding her own conjecture to the facts that she has collected. A fascinating read." — Beth (5 out of 5 stars)
"This book grabbed me and would not let me go! The fact that a socially and historically prominent man could maintain two different lives separate from each other is amazing! Sandweiss does a great job of adding her own conjecture to the facts that she has collected. A fascinating read."
“An astounding true story…Sandweiss offers a fine, mesmerizing account of how one extremely secretive man, ‘acting from a complicated mix of loyalty and self-interest, reckless desire and social conservatism,’ could encapsulate his country’s shifting ideas about race in the course of one family’s anything but black-and-white history.”
Ms. Sandweiss offers a fine, mesmerizing account.
“There was another side to King that neither the public nor his glittering friends knew, a side that Martha A. Sandweiss explores with great sensitivity, insight, and painstaking research in Passing Strange…[an] immensely fascinating work.”
“Fascinating.”
“[Sandweiss] tells [Clarence King’s story] with a scholar’s rigor and a storyteller’s verve…A sophisticated work of scholarship.”
“Sandweiss serves a delicious brew of public accomplishment and domestic intrigue in this dual biography of the geologist-explorer Clarence King (1842–1901) and Ada Copeland (c. 1861–1964), a ‘black, working-class woman’ who was ‘born a slave.’”
“One of the best-known men of his time crosses the racial divide—in reverse…An intriguing look at long-held secrets, Jim Crow, bad faith—and also, as Sandweiss observes, ‘love and longing that transcends the historical bounds of time and place.’”
“Lorna Raver does a credible job with this story, giving a solid but unobtrusive performance well suited to the subject matter.”
“Lorna Raver reads with enthusiasm and a deliberate delivery. There isn’t much opportunity for characterizations as Ada and Clarence/James don’t speak, but Raver makes sure you don’t miss a word of this well-researched story…A feel-good story well presented.”
"Passing Strange combines remarkable detective work, riveting storytelling, and the enduring question of race to fashion a most unusual but very American family saga.”
" An interesting story, perhaps a little thin on information to fill a volume of this size so the author "
" This book is awesome. I hardly put it down when I had time to read. I was so intrigued with Mr. King and his choice to live such a double life. It is a must read. "
" While I was very impressed by the sheer amount of information the author must have read through to uncover such an amazing story--sometimes I felt I was drowning in details... Such a compelling true story--I loved the secret glimpse I had into the personal and political climate of a very important time in our nation's history... "
" A remarkable story of a remarkable man and his highly unusual life. And a book in need of serious editing - half the length would have made a prize winning book. As it is, the book still tells of unique lives. "
" Not one of my facorites "
" Really fascinating story, but clearly not enough for more than maybe a New Yorker article, resulting in a ton of dull, irrelevant filler. Skimmed thru much of this book. "
" I rarely give five stars, but if ever a book proved that "truth is stranger than fiction," this is it. An incredible read. "
" Interesting, attention keeping. Good story. Readability was good. I stayed up and read it until I was done. "
" It reads like the history channel. I liked the concept for the book more than I enjoyed the actual book. It was very repetive at times, which was also annoying. Overall the book was ok, but it could have been about 100 pages shorter. "
" A very readable book, and certainly a fascinating story. For a class dealing with census records, this would be a really interesting read: it's amazing what one can do with so little hard evidence. Certainly accessible to undergraduates. "
" Read my review at my blog. "
" just not enough actual details to be of more than passing interest. paid $6 for it and was slightly disappointed. "
" The story was interesting but the construction was a bit clunky at times (lots and lots of quotes). Overall, it was a good read. "
" I was disappointed. The book is full of speculation and not much at all of the relationship between Clarence and Ada. I realize not much exists, but it leaves the book with a big hole. It would make a better short story on TV than a 300 page book. "
" This story in this book is the fascinating true story of a white man in the late 19th century who led a secret life with a colored woman. While I enjoyed the story, it was perhaps a bit too bogged down in details. "
" Fascinating tale of a double life in the Guilded Age "
Martha A. Sandweiss is professor of history at Princeton University. She began her career as a museum curator and taught for twenty years at Amherst College. She is the author of numerous works of western American history and the history of photography, including Print the Legend: Photography and the American West, winner of the Organization of American Historians’ Ray Allen Billington Award, and Laura Gilpin: An Enduring Grace. She is also co-editor of the Oxford History of the American West.
Lorna Raver, named one of AudioFile magazine’s Best Voices of the Year, has received numerous Audie Award nominations and many AudioFile Earphones Awards. She has appeared on stage in New York, Los Angeles, and regional theaters around the country. Among her many television credits are NYPD Blue, Judging Amy, Boston Legal, ER, and Star Trek. She starred in director Sam Raimi’s film Drag Me to Hell.
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