Nathan Lee Gadsden

Across the Bridge Nathan Lee Gadsden

Across the Bridge - In the 1960s, fourteen-year-old Eddie Jordan seizes the opportunity to attend a prestigious New England prep school. In doing so, he leaves his predominantly black school system in his hometown to enter the private educational world of White society. Through his own experiences and the experiences of his new classmates, he is confronted with issues of race, class, and sexual identity. And along the way, he battles a personal demon. Across the Bridge depicts the struggles of a small minority of black students as they fight racism on a front far different from the urban battlegrounds that usually characterize the racial turmoil of the 1960s. The serene setting of Whitfield Academy contrasts with the tumultuous setting of Eddie Jordan's hometown; however, the issues are the same and, in some ways, more pronounced at Whitfield.