The Last Juror

1083 Words3 Pages

The Book "The Juror" was based around the 1970's, in a small Mississippian town called Clanton, (Now even though it was the 70's segregation was still pretty big in Mississippi) The book starts off by telling about the main character, Willie Traynor. Willie went to collage and during his last year he dropped out. So he went to his grandmother who gave him the money to buy the newspaper in a small town call Clanton, Mississippi, that he had always wanted to buy. So after getting the money Willie moves to Clanton, and buys the newspaper.

Also living in the town of Clanton was Rhoda Kassellaw, and Danny Padgett. Rhoda Kassellaw was your average widow, she had two children, and pretty much always kept to herself. Danny Padgett, on the other hand, was a rich man. Danny lived with his parents on top of a mountain, on Padgett Island, off the coast of Mississippi. His family was very rich and very powerful. They were like the Italian Mafia of Mississippi, into smuggling, drugs, ect.

One night Danny Padgett broke into Rhoda Kassellaw's house and raped her in front of her children. After being raped Rhoda ran across the street to her neighbors and when they came outside she said "it's Danny Padgett" then died.

With the rape and death of Rhoda Kassellaw going on Willie saw it as a great opportunity to finally make something of the local newspaper. So he took cover of the story. He even took pictures of the crime scene and posted them on the front page of the paper, which back then wasn't something people did, but Willie didn't care.

Besides covering the rape and death of Rhoda Willie also wrote a once-a-week article on one person of the town. While writing these articles Willie decided he wanted to go to the other side of town, where the blacks live, and write an article about Mrs. Callie Ruffin. Mrs. Callie has nine children, all grown up. Eight of them are attorney's, the other, Sam, she never sees because he got ran out of town for being with a white woman, and was never to come back again.

After writing about Mrs. Callie Willie decides to become more closer with her. The end up being best friends. He takes her out to movies, dinner, always in a black restaurant, so she never feels awkward, and even manages to smuggle Sam in town at night so she can see him.

Open Document