Arkansas Books

If one can view history as if it were groomed with a fine toothed comb, Dewey W. Grantham has viewed and displayed it as such. In The South in Modern America A Region At Odds, Grantham clips and styles his interpretation of history into a well-coifed account of the complex post-Reconstruction history of the South. Packing an extensive body of data into four hundred pages, he adds insight to a confusing era in American history. Although his point, counter-point style of comparison tends to be confusing, and his considerable use of statistics is coupled with plentiful politico name dropping, his knowledge of the era is evident in his work. Beginning with the sluggish economy that followed Reconstruction, Grantham describes the contrast between North and South and the differences between their industrial and agrarian societies. The industrialized North gained control of the limited southern corporations and industries and the resources that supplied them. The poor farmers of the South were, according to Grantham, "poorer than other Americans. Those who farmed -- the great majority of the region's inhabitants -- were steadily more landless" while workers in the South had fewer vocational and industrial skills during the era. The "Lost Cause" became the myth of the region through the declamation of men like Confederate hero, General John B. Gordon. By linking religion and Confederate images together a "civil religion" formed in the minds, hearts and legends of the southern populace. "This mythology," Grantham claims, "became a powerful factor in shaping southern politics during the next half-century." Quoting economist Gavin Wright, Grantham describes the South as a "colonial economy" in the control and coercion of the society to the north. Railroads, mines, financial corporations furnaces and many distribution institutions in the South were owned and controlled by northerners. The Spanish American War of 1898 brought northerners and southerners together to rally around the American flag. Nationalism superseded sectional diversity while political realignment in the late 1890's helped to "disfranchise most blacks..., and create the Solid South. The Populist movement grew in the region. Southern politicians gained influence and domination of the Democratic party in Washington. The economic outlook brightened while racial freedoms diminished. "By the turn of the century," Grantham states, illustrating the nation's passivity concerning African-American rights, "some southerners were contemplating a new role for the South in American life, a role made possible by the North's... ultimate approval of the southern mission to preserve the nation's racial purity." Moving into the era of Woodrow Wilson's presidency and World War I, Grantham slides into a deluge of political names -- McLemore of Texas, Swanson and Tillman of the Senate Committee on Naval Affairs, Kitchin of the House Ways and Means Committee, William Jennings Bryan. On and on he seems to name the entire congress and presidential cabinet of the Wilson period. His accuracy is obvious, but his prose is lost and adrift in the sea of names and political positions. With the rise of Franklin D. Roosevelt to power, regional differences were tolerated. Roosevelt's use of local political power, however, did little to change the structure of politics and racial freedom in the South. Nevertheless, "it did a good deal to change the political outlook of southerners," by creating "a politics of class and economic interest in the South...." The South began to catch up with the other regions of the nation. After the Second World War a "South within the North" was generated by the lower-class job-searching transients moving into northern ghettos. With the outbreak of rioting of the 1960's in northern and western cities, the inequality of blacks and their demand for change stood preeminently in national political debate. The Civil Rights movement gained momentum and force in violent as well as non-violent expression. "Many white northerners viewed the ghetto riots as evidence of black ingratitude," Grantham explains, with light sarcasm, "since they themselves in large numbers had supported the earlier objectives of the equal rights movement. But now the reformers were going beyond the overthrow of Jim Crow to demand things like jobs, open housing, and better schools." Into Americana came the terms "busing" and "affirmative action," terms frowned upon by "most whites, North and South." With the southern strategy of Richard Nixon the end to the "Second Reconstruction" of the South was complete. Nixon's opposition to busing and "excesses" of the civil rights movement satisfied demands of conservatives of in the South. As the era waned, the stereotypical view of a racist South began to dissipate as the "Sunbelt South" emerged. No longer was the region a "colonial appendage" of the North and Midwest. North and South intermingled in the industrial parks and retirement Sun-Cities that flourished below the Mason-Dixon Line. Grantham concludes by stating, "The South has been almost as essential to the North... [as] North to the South in shaping of national character and mythology.... The reciprocal effects of this regional interaction reveal an important aspect of the national experience." It was, he says, integral to the shaping of the nation. The South modified the direction of the North as much as the North did in redirecting the South -- two parts of the whole. The inter-regional compromises accommodated the economical, ideological and political interest in both regions. Grantham's work is a valuable lesson in Southern history. The span of time and the enormity of information needed to explain the post-civil-war South can excuse one obvious shortcoming in his text. In background information for his readers he omits the adequate and full definition of various terms; Jim Crow, progressivism and populism being examples. These exclusions can send one searching through the closest, convenient encyclopedia or reference on the history of the region. One can conclude that Grantham has the assumption that the reader has previous knowledge of the expressions. A newcomer to southern history can become lost in the immensity of the work -- but it's a good work in which to find oneself lost. -- James D. Byous

Bill Jones and his many fine companions have compiled a truly noteworthy collection of stories, reviews, columns and more. I spent hours and hours poring over this distinguished work.

SPORTS WARS
Reviewed by Richard Arlin (Dick) Stull, Department of Health and Physical
Education, Humboldt State University, Arcata, California

archived from Arete Sport Literature Association

OCTOBER 5, 2004

Dream On

It was 1970. I stared across my desk in my high school English class into the intense eyes
of a guest lecturer -- a well-muscled, bearded ex-football player whom I'd seen for years
on television destroying hapless NFL running backs. He had a message that astounded
me: that football was a capitalist, racist, exploitive game -- and that he had just retired at
the top of his career to try to affect social change.
The class was silent. I considered whether I should hazard a question. Tentatively, I
raised my hand and asked, "Don't you think you're being unrealistic and idealistic?"
He looked through me and paused for a moment.
"It starts with you," he said.
Like those running backs I'd seen careening out of bounds after a jarring hit, I was shaken
up. The player was former St. Louis Cardinals linebacker, Dave Meggyesy. A product of
the Sixties, Meggyesy was one of many athletes who were outspoken about their political
beliefs. The very meaning of sport in society was being challenged, not only by the
athletes that played them, but also by students, academics, and even university
administrators. Many also questioned not only the notion that athletic participation builds
character but the methods used to "build character."
These issues, according to author David Zang in his book Sports Wars: Athletes in the
Age of Aquarius occurred in the Sixties on many fronts, from Muhammad Ali's defiance
of the military draft, to the exposés and autobiographies that questioned every aspect of
sport and the institutions that were part of sport. Well written, well referenced and
thought provoking, this is a must-read for American Studies, American History,
Sociology or anyone who is interested in the role of sport in American society.
Zang writes:
Many factors impinged on the old sports ideology-the quest for profits, television ratings
points, and advertising dollars. Certainly, beginning in the 1950's, big money, television,
and critical media helped to create a climate of inescapable scrutiny and overexposure
that was inhospitable to myth making. But these things, along with a large influx of black
athletes and the beginnings of female insistence on sharing the playing fields, were only
parts of a fuller explanation.
Money and celebrity were always a part of our sports, but what you cannot trace back
beyond the Vietnam era is the cultural tension that undermined SportsWorld's claims to
character building and the tenets by which organized sports were conducted: sacrificial
effort, submission to authority, controlled physical dominance, victory with honor, and
manliness (for, above all, organized sports were self-consciously male before this time).
Zang opens his book with an account and analysis of the volatile reaction to
singer/guitarist Jose Feliciano's rendition of The Star Spangled Banner at Tiger Stadium
on October 7, 1968, before Game Five of the World Series between Detroit and St. Louis.
Feliciano's "personal expression" was met with approval by some, derision by others.
Zang contrasts the careers and lifestyles of Olympic wrestlers Dan Gable and Dave
Sanders in Chapter 2. The Spartan, maniacal training methods and zeal of Gable vs. the
counterculture, free-spirited Sanders is living myth at its best.
Zang writes, "As Gable was following the unswerving path mapped by his conviction,
Sanders was moving through life like mercury on a tabletop." He cites Warren Susman's
observations about the collision of two visions -- "self-sacrifice and self-realization."
Chapter 3 is a classic case study of an institution trying to reconcile the conflicting values
inherent in the volatile mix of sports and academia. Zang gives the reader an overview of
University of Pennsylvania's Athletic Director Jeremiah Ford II's (1953-1967)
experimentation with a de-emphasis on winning; that is, playing for its own sake: "The
tension between Ford's approach and the response of angry alumni had roots in Penn's
schizophrenic institutional history and the role of athletics in the school's identity."
One of Chapter 4's themes is the introduction of new prototype athletes in America. 1972
Olympic marathon gold medallist Frank Shorter, for example, had the "body of a
bookworm, and the gentle instincts of a hippie." And sport wasn't necessarily just about
winning any more. It was about personal fitness and even self-transformation.
The early career of Muhammad Ali is the subject of Chapter 5. The juxtaposition of Ali's
self-analysis compared to Zang's is highly enlightening. Zang quotes Ali:
All kinds of people come to see me. Women come because I was saying; 'I'm so pretty,'
and they wanted to look at me. Some white people, they got tired of my bragging. They
thought I was arrogant and talked too much, so they came to see someone give the nigger
a whuppin'. Longhaired hippies came to my fights because I wouldn't go to Vietnam. And
black people, the ones with sense, they were saying, 'Right on, brother; show them
honkies.' Everyone in the whole country was talking about me.
Contrast Ali's personal take with Zang's cultural analysis:
Even stranger was Ali's own paradoxical contribution to the meaning of race and color:
that he, light-skinned and pretty, suspicion of white blood tainting his claims to racial
exclusivity, had come to embody the hopes, anger, and venom of so many blacks- had
risen to become king of the world not only by beating other blacks but also by
humiliating them publicly in the demeaning language used for centuries by whites- by
addressing them as 'nigger' in the most casual of utterances, by pronouncing them dumb
and unworthy, and by pointing out their similarity to apes. If Joe Frazier was, as Ali
constantly maintained, a 'gorilla' in contrast to his own café au lait look-it was a stern
refutation of more than Frazier's countenance. If black was truly beautiful, then how
could Frazier be an 'ugly gorilla.'
A recent HBO special and public comments by Frazier attest to the psychic effects that
Ali's unfair characterizations had upon Frazier, effects far more profound than the
punches he took in his three epic fights with Ali.
Chapter 6 deals with the revolt of the University of Maryland football team against their
traditional coach Bob Wade. Among the many interesting anecdotes in this chapter is a
player commenting on the coach's seeming inability to accept the notion that talent might
trump hard work.
Finally, Zang briefly surveys American sports films and follows with a critical analysis of
the 1976 comedy, Bad News Bears. In contrast to Best Picture of the Year, Rocky, "The
Bears offered the first film portrait of a new culture that no longer believed sport and
good character were synonymous terms."
Zang's agile alliterations and similes ("the baby boomers moved through society like a
pig in a python") add to his already alluring analysis. He is at his best in alluding to how
sport could not escape the greater cultural earthquakes of opposition to the Vietnam war,
racial strife, and the counterculture movement. During the 60's, sports as last bastion for
patriotism and American values was openly challenged by courageous athletes who
risked establishment disapproval, their reputations and their livelihoods.
Ever since Alan Bloom's Closing of the American Mind (1987), where the activists and
students of the Sixties were portrayed as spoiled, self-indulgent, uncritical and selfinvolved,
popular culture has trivialized the era. The era has become a parody, a
caricature in TV sitcoms, and a whipping boy for conservative politicians, talk-show
hosts and authors for many of today's social ills. Zang refuses to simplify the era or the
athletes who were a part of it. In our current age where the standard mantra is often
"there's no team in me," or "show me the money," it is inspiring to see how and why
certain individuals challenged basic societal assumptions from within the most
conservative of our institutions -- sports. Zang writes:
Of course, those mythical fields never really existed, and in ignoring the '60s when
confronting our dissatisfaction with the state of organized sports at the turn of the
century, we are running from a past. What we are dismissing or avoiding is the
realization that many baby boomers- in some cases, against all probabilities- once
wrestled in sports with the same sense of oppression, of limits, and of corruption that led
a great number of young people to the counterculture.
After reading Zang's book, I reread Dave Meggyesy's groundbreaking Out of Their
League (1970) and watched the movie Bad News Bears (1976). They still seemed
contemporary. And Meggysey is still crusading for social justice in 2004. Dream on?
David W. Zang. Sports Wars: Athletes in the Age of Aquarius. Fayetteville, Arkansas:
University of Arkansas Press, 2001. 180 pages. Photographs and bibliographic
references. $25.00 (hardback). ISBN 1-55728-713-9.
Copyright © 2004 by Richard Arlin Stull

Accessible, memorable, superbly executed poetry by a master poet and experienced wordsmith. Giants: After Creation, in the last chapter/Before the flood, is the short-short story/Of those Nephilim, the angels who fell//From Grace, in turn, giving birth to the giants/In the earth, everything in vain because//Shortly thereafter, they drowned for their sins/In the deluge, none of them saved like apes...

I had high expectations for this book and they were easily met. The Images are mostly photos but there are also hand drawn navigation maps of a few key areas along the river. It's amazing to see the traffic that occured along the entire length of this river, all the way up into Missouri even, crossing shoals and rapids, and relying souly on the flow of the river. It was an era in Arkansas history that played a major role in it's development but is often overlooked or forgotten.

"A brilliant, totally enthralling book." - Edward Abbey, author of The Monkey Wrench Gang and Desert Solitaire

"Laurence Gonzales is one of the very few truly brave writers of narrative I know." - Richard Rhodes, author of The Making of the Atomic Bomb.

Very surprised to find this listed here even as an out of print book. I did this back in 1986 with the Rogers Historical Museum as an Arkansas Sesquacentennial project. It examines and tells the story of thirty-six historic quilts and their makers.

In 1976-1977, archaeological investications were made on certain portions of the Arkansas River in Oklahoma to determine whether wave-action and shoreline erosion had damaged area cultural resources. Over 150 sites were checked, of which 34 were considered Register-eligible. Some sites would, if additional investigations were made, contribute to the closing of certain information gaps in the prehistoric record of the state. At the time of survey, sites were exposed by unusually low river levels. Most sites have since been re-inundated. The depth of analysis continues to make this a valuable reference work.

I really enjoyed this book. Kate Ross is a very strong character in this book. Hiram is a hoot!!! IF YOU LOVE A GOOD WESTERN YOU WILL LOVE THIS ONE.

This book is about Tessa, a free-spirited 14 year old who grows up in the 1940's. As an impressionable teenager in that era, she learns to deal with many circumstances which are thrust upon her - the differences she faces at school with other students who don't understand her passion for archaeology, the issue of her best friend being a Black American boy and the slow and confusing disintegration of her parents marriage, particularly her mothers resentment toward Tessa's father. All this while learning to juggle her emotions and feelings with common sense. A beautiful book which is inspirational and captivating.