ABSTRACT
One last bastion of southern, in fact of global, mythology needed to fall before substantial progress could be made in race relations; this was the depiction of white women as insensate, helpless, and in need of male protection against lusty darker men. Partly because that image of white females was not especially old, it fractured by the 1890s. That is not to say it disappeared, for it remained dear to some southern and other hearts for several more decades. Contradiction continued to be one of the South’s salient characteristics.
