Beginning with her great-great grandfather Moses Calhoun, a house slave who used the rare advantage of his education to become a successful businessman in post-war Atlanta, Buckley follows her family's two branches: one that stayed in the South, and the other that settled in Brooklyn. Their paths intersected with many prominent figures including Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington, Walter White, W. E. B. Du Bois, and Langston Hughes. Through the lens of her relatives' momentous lives, Buckley examines major events throughout American history. From Atlanta during Reconstruction and the rise of Jim Crow, to New York City during the Harlem Renaissance, from world wars to the civil rights movement, this ambitious, brilliant family witnessed and participated in the most crucial events of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Combining personal and national history, The Black Calhouns is a unique and vibrant portrait of six generations during dynamic times of struggle and triumph.