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The Hardest Deal of All

2005 non-fiction book by Charles C. Bolton

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionFeb 27, 2026
Entity authorityQ113827387 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Hardest Deal of All: The Battle Over School Integration in Mississippi, 1870-1980 is a non-fiction book by Charles C. Bolton, published in 2005 by the University Press of Mississippi.

Background

Documents from the Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission and oral histories were used as sources.

Contents

The book presents information in historic sequence.

The establishment of a segregated schooling system in Mississippi is detailed in the first chapter. The white community's opposition to Brown v. Board of Education is detailed in the midpoint of the book.

Reception

Hassan Kwame Jeffries of Ohio State University wrote that the work "succeeds in" explaining the effect discriminatory practices had on the state's government-operated K-12 education.

References

Jeffries, Hasan Kwame (2007). "The Hardest Deal of All: The Battle over School Integration in Mississippi, 1870-1980". Journal of Southern History.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “The Hardest Deal of All” as 2005 non-fiction book by Charles C. Bolton. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Hardest, Deal and non-fiction.

Editorial reviewA useful identification and reception guide that helps separate the work itself from editions, performances, ownership and later interpretation. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1870, 1980, 2005, 2007—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Hardest, Deal and non-fiction providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “The Hardest Deal of All”, the useful work is to connect “2005 non-fiction book by Charles C. Bolton” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Feb 27, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q113827387. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1870, 1980, 2005 and 2007.

Critical limits

Titles can refer to several editions, objects or performances, making precise identification essential before interpretation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “The Hardest Deal of All”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow The Hardest Deal of All primary sources, The Hardest Deal of All archive and Hardest research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “The Hardest Deal of All”?
  2. Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
  3. How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “The Hardest Deal of All” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.