Despite Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and pervasive discrimination, a substantial number of African Americans entered the middle class before World War I. This was a life - little known to outsiders - of college graduations, formal weddings, and singing around the piano in the parlor. Peggy Wood was born into such a world in 1912. Her memoir is a parting of the curtains that kept much of this world from view. For this reason, ""Something Must Be Done"" belongs on the shelf alongside Sarah and Elizabeth Delaney's 1993 classic ""Having Our Say"".