Book excerpt: An acclaimed local author recounts the evolution of Richmond’s alternative newspapers, comics, and small presses beginning in the Civil Rights Era. As the political and social upheaval of the 1960s took hold across the United States, even the sleepy town of Richmond, Virginia, experienced a countercultural shift. New attitudes about the value of journalism spurred an underground movement in the press. “The Sunflower,” Richmond’s first underground newspaper, appeared in 1967 and set the stage for a host of alternative local media lasting into the 1990s and beyond. Publications such as the “Richmond Chronicle,” “Richmond Mercury,” and “Commonwealth Times,” as well as numerous minority-focused presses such as “Richmond Afro-American,” served the progressive-minded citizens of the River City. In Richmond Independent Press, the historian, activist and former “ThroTTle” editor Dale Brumfield reveals the untold story of this cultural revolution in the River City.