ow with seven children who lived in the projects. Her husband had been a bartender. The Divers were a young, white professional couple with two sons who moved into Boston's interracial South End. Colin Diver was described by Lukas as a young idealistic attorney when he went to work as an assistant to Boston's Mayor Kevin White. His wife supported his acceptance of the job and the family relocation.
The struggle of the Twymons and the McGoffs constitutes the major perspective for this book. Both families struggled against tremendous obstacles. Alice McGoff is unsympathetic with the plight of blacks. Lukas writes that she wondered what blacks thought they were doing? They acted as if they were the only people who had ever had it tough in this world. Poor was poor and hungry was hungry. The housing project in which the McGoffs lived was not better than those in the ghetto. The discrimination which blacks confronted was no worse than the arrogance and indifference which the Irish had faced when they came to this country (Lukas, 1986, p. 22).
The white, Jewish, and predominantly Italian North End communities were not affected when busing was instituted. Busing was implemented in the two poorest communities which were the least able to deal with the difficulties and conflicts created by busing both economically and historically--the poor Irish and the poor blacks.
The serious researcher may have some doubts about the accuracy of the reporting in Common Ground. Lukas does make a few obvious errors. For example, he wrote that Joe Kennedy Jr. was shot down over Germany (p. 24). In fact, the oldest Kennedy son was killed over England. However, the book presents an engrossing story of Boston's race problems. The book is anecdot
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