U-M Historian Wins Pulitzer For Book On Attica Uprisings

A University of Michigan professor has won the Pulitzer Prize for a book about a 1971 prison uprising that is regarded as the most important civil rights events of the last century. Heather Ann Thompson won the prize for “Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy,” a narrative history the Pulitzer jury said “sets high standards for scholarly judgment and tenacity of inquiry in seeking the truth” about the prison riots.

Thompson’s book examines the events following the Sept. 9, 1971, takeover of the upstate New York correctional facility by 1,300 mostly minority prisoners protesting years of mistreatment and abuse. More than three dozen guards and civilian employees of the prison were taken hostage in a siege that lasted four days and nights as inmates demanded the federal government take control of the prison and improve conditions for the prisoners.

The standoff ended on Sept. 13, 1971, when then New York Gov. Nelson Rockefeller — who had refused to visit the prison to talk with inmates or offer amnesty to the prisoners for the riot — ordered the state police and the National Guard to take back the prison in what Thompson describes as a brutal retaliation.

Ten hostages and 29 inmates were killed in the action, and it was later determined that all of the hostages were killed by friendly fire. More than 100 people were severely wounded. New York authorities prosecuted the inmates, but none of those involved in retaking the prison.

Thompson pored over research for more than a decade and her book “sheds light on every aspect of the uprising and its legacy, giving voice to all those who took part in the forty-five-year fight for justice: prisoners, former hostages, families of the victims, lawyers and judges, and state officials and members and law enforcement,” according to a synopsis of “Blood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its Legacy,” on Amazon.com.

“ ‘Blood in the Water’ is the searing and indelible record of one of the most important civil rights stories of the last century,” according to Amazon.

“The real villains in this story are neither the inmates nor the guards of Attica,” Thompson said in a statement, “but the officials outside the system who had the knowledge and power to enact reform, but chose to do nothing.”

Thompson, who won her Pulitzer in the category of Letters, Drama & Music, is a professor of history, Afroamerican and African Studies, as well as a research affiliate in the Population Studies Center in the Institute for Social Research.

In a statement, U-M President Mark Schlissel said her accomplishment is “an outstanding example of our faculty's talent and commitment to academic rigor being recognized at the highest levels.

"I am proud to congratulate her on this amazing achievement,” he said.

The Pulitzer Prize is the latest accolade for the book, which The New York Times named its most notable book for 2016 and the book of the year by The Boston Globe, Newsweek, Kirkus and Publishers Weekly. It was a National Book Award finalist and Los Angeles Times Book Prize finalist.

Photo via University of Michigan