The Acknowl­edg­ments sec­tion express­es deep grat­i­tude to numer­ous indi­vid­u­als who con­tributed to the cre­ation of the book, par­tic­u­lar­ly rec­og­niz­ing the late John Lewis for his invalu­able coop­er­a­tion and insights. The author recounts their meet­ing with Lewis in Feb­ru­ary 2019 in Atlanta, where he pledged sup­port for the project. Due to the pan­dem­ic, per­son­al inter­views were replaced by mean­ing­ful phone con­ver­sa­tions, pro­vid­ing the author with rich nar­ra­tives about Lewis’s life. Michael Collins, Lewis’s chief of staff, played a cru­cial role by facil­i­tat­ing access to var­i­ous indi­vid­u­als and ver­i­fy­ing the fac­tu­al integri­ty of the nar­ra­tive.

A sig­nif­i­cant part of the author’s research involved inter­view­ing around 250 indi­vid­u­als, includ­ing promi­nent fig­ures like Pres­i­dent Oba­ma, Pres­i­dent Clin­ton, and Sec­re­tary of State Hillary Clin­ton, who shared their expe­ri­ences and mem­o­ries of John Lewis. Their con­tri­bu­tions, along with insights from Lewis’s fam­i­ly, col­leagues, and friends, are cru­cial in explor­ing his life, espe­cial­ly where archival mate­ri­als were sparse.

The author extends grat­i­tude to those who shared pri­vate mate­ri­als or con­duct­ed inter­views with Lewis, high­light­ing the efforts of Archie Allen, who had attempt­ed to write a biog­ra­phy of Lewis in 1968, and pro­vid­ed exten­sive archival access. Col­lab­o­ra­tions with his­to­ri­ans and insti­tu­tions con­tributed to the depth of the research, includ­ing access to Hen­ry Louis Gates’s mate­ri­als from “Find­ing Your Roots” and invalu­able record­ings from Dan­ny Lyon and Sean Wilentz.

The acknowl­edg­ments also spot­light the sup­port from archivists and librar­i­ans at dif­fer­ent insti­tu­tions, par­tic­u­lar­ly those at Rut­gers Uni­ver­si­ty and the New York Pub­lic Library, who facil­i­tat­ed research efforts. The author appre­ci­ates schol­ar­ly con­tri­bu­tions from var­i­ous his­to­ri­ans and jour­nal­ists, enrich­ing the nar­ra­tive with diverse per­spec­tives on the civ­il rights move­ment.

The author acknowl­edges the back­ing from Rut­gers Uni­ver­si­ty, cit­ing sup­port from var­i­ous offi­cials and col­leagues who fos­tered a con­ducive envi­ron­ment for research. Exter­nal grants and fel­low­ships fur­ther enabled the com­ple­tion of the project, with thanks giv­en to mul­ti­ple orga­ni­za­tions and indi­vid­u­als for their finan­cial and moral sup­port.

The author’s research assis­tants, par­tic­u­lar­ly Kather­ine Thai, are com­mend­ed for their con­tri­bu­tions. The emo­tion­al sup­port from writ­ing groups, men­tors, and fam­i­ly mem­bers, espe­cial­ly dur­ing the chal­leng­ing phas­es of writ­ing, is also not­ed. Final­ly, the author ded­i­cates the work to their par­ents, cred­it­ing them for inspir­ing a ded­i­ca­tion to social jus­tice themes explored through­out Lewis’s life, which is now cap­tured in this biog­ra­phy .