The Wayfarers: Journeying through a Century of Change

Virginia Ames was born in the Deep South at the dawn of the twentieth century. In her hundredth year, Ames takes us back to the 1970 cross-country sojourn wherein she and daughter Mary poignantly and critically looked at a century of sociability and social change—including race relations, revolutionary politics, the auto, space exploration, and flight. Braided into the sinuous strands of an epic journey in an old Dodge Wayfarer are stories of a lifetime of issues that continue to touch our lives. Ames muses on upheavals in how Americans act and think, and how, in spite of our nation’s progress, some things don’t change.

From the Deep South to California, Ames paints word-pictures for us to experience firsthand. Transported through her experiences, impressions, and the characters she met along the way, readers will tune into a cultural history one will never find in history books.

Wayfarers is crowned with the author’s art images from the colorful Southwest to the Mediterranean and South Pacific and archival photos that make her anecdotes come alive. With each mile of this travel adventure, prepare for surprises, new sights, and fresh insights …