The culmination of nearly a decade of research in regional archives and census bureaus, Buried in the Bitter Waters presents irrefutable evidence of brutal attacks on blacks by ordinary white Americans. The property-burnings, assaults, and killings occurred between the period of Reconstruction and the Great Depression, and no part of the U.S. was immune. The violence was largely successful in its aim of driving blacks out of areas. More troubling, Jaspin's research indicates those areas most effected remain largely white, making his findings not merely an interesting historical exposé but a troubling commentary on the ongoing state of race relations in the U.S.