This volume explores the appeal of "Amos 'n' Andy", the most popular radio serial of all time. Ely narrates a tale of the shifting and ambiguous colour line in 20th-century America, and recreates the engaging genius of the famed duo through the heyday of radio.

His "Amos 'n' Andy" reveals a society less and less able to defend the most obvious flaw in the democratic order - the colour line - yet still unwilling to erase it once and for all.