“The Stirring of the Water” 19    in the courts toward local African Americans. The letters of correspon- dence between the local branch and the national office of the NAACP during the 1940s help paint a picture of Nixon as a passionate and ag- gressive leader who would not let the slightest injustice or insult go un- challenged. While Nixon’s tenacity was vital for change to happen in the Jim Crow South, his concern over the minutiae of local branch affairs and concerns could prove wearisome for even the most ardent activists. Even Ella Baker seemed to grow weary of Nixon’s detailed appeals to the national office for rulings to solve local disputes. Baker ended one letter to Nixon concerning the use of branch monies for a USO party for returning World War II veterans: “Nevertheless, I do not believe that the money spent for the veterans’ social should be made a major issue.” Although Nixon’s intensity could prove controversial and threatening and even exhausting to those around him, the local pastor Solomon Seay recognized in him “an entwined combination of courage and wisdom. He was well qualified to be standing at the threshold of a change in the 20 course of history.” Despite his bold public stands, Nixon developed a few connections with whites in Montgomery. As early as 1945, he was part of clandestine interracial gatherings at Dexter Avenue Methodist Church, a white con- gregation led by Reverend Andrew Turnipseed. The group met in the middle of the night to avoid reprisals. Many of those who gathered—a group that included ASC professor J. E. Pierce, Tuskegee professor Dean Gomillion, and Southern Farmer editor Gould Beech—played a role in the 1946 populist-inspired gubernatorial campaign of Jim Folsom, who served as Alabama governor from 1947 to 1951 and again from 1955 to 1959. While Turnipseed was not the only white challenging segrega- tion in Montgomery, he claimed no other Methodist ministers publicly supported his efforts: “The other Methodist preachers here that I could count on was none. They had never been in the stirring of the water of While fellow clergy did not support his efforts, a this kind of matter.” handful of former New Deal Democrats in Montgomery brought a vi- 21 brant, if small, white contingent advocating for racial change. Following the death of Franklin Roosevelt in 1945, many connected to his administration began to depart the capital, including Aubrey Wil- liams, who had served as the executive director of the National Youth