Profiles the lives of three families in the 1970s as they deal with urban racial issues and school desegregation in Boston over a ten-year period. Follows the McGoff, Twyman, and Diver families, which include a widowed Irish-American family, an African-American family, and a white liberal middle-class family. Describes each family's historical roots and the role of the public figures who shaped the course of the families' lives.