Arkansas: A Narrative History

Rating:
Summary: The Banana Republic
Review: History books from provincial history departments frequently suffer from effusions of PC revisionism. This one is unusual in that despite its ghastly book jacket, soberly approaches (perhaps too soberly) the most colorful region of the United States. The Wild West of film and pulp westerns lasted only about fifteen years while the Arkansas Wild West has extended from the 1820s until the present day. But, it is also more than a history of scoundrels in elected office, corrupt fundamentalist preachers, bozos, ... and bumpkins. It chronicles a society that produced ..., local Rockefeller philanthropy, the triumph over hookworm and pellagra. Indeed, the only place in America that Bill Clinton could be from is Arkansas. Nobody would ever believe it if this were a movie.
On the down side, the text is uneven, and often stilted. There are references to African Americans but none to Anglo Americans, Teutonic Americans or Mongrel Americans. In short this is a relatively good history for the times.