Schmeling Max Schmeling, German boxer who defeated Joe Louis in 1936. In 1938, Louis regained his heavyweight title, defeating Schmeling in the first round of their fight.
sharecroppers people who worked land for a share of the crops, especially tenant farmers. In the South, black sharecroppers generally lived in extreme poverty and were treated as little more than slaves by white landowners.
The driver drove slowly to keep down the dust. Here, dust symbolizes death.
the quarter rows of cabins associated with designated plantations, isolated from the larger world. The quarter served as a home for slaves in the nineteenth century and the homes of sharecroppers in the twentieth century. The cabins had no electricity or running water until after World War II.
Their forefathers said that we're only three-fifths human. Grant's comment refers to the "three-fifths compromise" in the United States Constitution. According to this compromise, designed to placate both the North and the South, it was agreed to determine representatives and direct taxes "by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons." Although the Constitution does not mention the word "slavery," by this provision three slaves were counted for every five non-slaves (whites) in apportioning representation.
