The last campaign : Robert F. Kennedy and 82 days that inspired America / Thurston Clarke.

Includes bibliographical references (p. [307]-310) and index.

Prologue : June 8, 1968 -- pt. 1. Early days. -- No choice : March 16-17, 1968 -- "He's going all the way" : March 17-18, 1968 -- "Bobby ain't Jack" : March 21-31, 1968 -- pt. 2. "Prophets get shot". -- The era of good feelings : March 31-April 4, 1968 -- A prayer for our country : April 4-5, 1968 -- "Guns between me and the White House" : April 5-7, 1968 -- "Prophets get shot" : April 9, 1968 -- pt. 3. Red state primaries. -- Like Frank Sinatra running for president : April 10-15, 1968 -- Brave Heart and Christopher Pretty Boy : April 16 and May 11, 1968 -- "How does it look for me here?" : April 22-24, 1968 -- "From you!" : April 26, 1968 -- Riding with the next president : April 27, 1968 -- Mother Inn : May 3-14, 1968 -- pt. 4. The West coast. -- "This is peanuts" : May 15-28, 1968 -- Resurrection City : May 29, 1968 -- "The last of the great believables" : May 30-June 3, 1968 -- "So this is it" : June 4-5, 1968.

After JFK's assassination, Robert Kennedy--Jack's political warrior--almost lost hope. He was haunted by his brother's murder, and by the nation's inabilities to solve its problems of race, poverty, and the war in Vietnam. Bobby sensed the country's pain, and when he announced that he was running for president, the country united behind his hopes. Over the action-packed days of his campaign, Americans were inspired by Kennedy's promise of a better time. And after an assassin's bullet stopped this last great stirring public figure of the 1960s, crowds lined up along the country's railroad tracks to say goodbye to Bobby. Historian Clarke provides an absorbing historical narrative that goes right to the heart of America's deepest despairs--and most fiercely held dreams--and tells us more than we had understood before about this complicated man and the heightened personal, racial, political, and national dramas of his times.