Down on Mahans Creek
Title | Down on Mahans Creek PDF eBook |
Author | Benjamin G. Rader |
Publisher | University of Arkansas Press |
Pages | 403 |
Release | 2017-02-15 |
Genre | Social Science |
ISBN | 1610756029 |
In Down on Mahans Creek, Benjamin Rader provides a fascinating look at a neighborhood in the Missouri Ozarks from the early nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century. He explores the many ways in which Mahans Creek, though remote, was never completely isolated or self-sufficient. The residents were deeply affected by the Civil War, and the arrival of the railroad and the timber boom in the 1890s propelled the community into modern times, creating a more fast-paced and consumer-oriented way of life and a new moral sensibility. During the Great Depression the creek’s residents returned to some of the older values for survival. After World War II, modern technology changed their lives again, causing a movement away from the countryside and to the nearby small towns. Down on Mahans Creek tells the dynamic story of this distinctive neighborhood navigating the push and pull of the old and new ways of life.
When Grandpa Delivered Babies and Other Ozarks Vignettes
Title | When Grandpa Delivered Babies and Other Ozarks Vignettes PDF eBook |
Author | Benjamin G. Rader |
Publisher | University of Illinois Press |
Pages | 207 |
Release | 2024-02-27 |
Genre | Humor |
ISBN | 0252056604 |
People in the Ozarks have long told humorous vignettes that make sense of triumph and tragedy, relay family and local history, and of course entertain. Benjamin G. Rader’s memoir offers a loving portrait of the Ozarks of his youth, where his grandfather midwifed babies and his great uncle Jerry Rader laughed so hard at one of his own stories that he choked to death on a pork chop. As he reveals the Ozarks of the 1930s through 1950s, Rader dispels the myths of the region’s people as isolated and sharing a single set of values and behaviors. He also takes readers inside the life of the extended Rader family and its neighborhoods, each of which drew on storytelling to strengthen resolve in lives roiled by change, economic depression, and the shift of daily life from the country to the city. An alluring blend of remembering and reflection, When Grandpa Delivered Babies and Other Ozarks Vignettes provides a vivid portrait of a fading time.
Yesterday Today
Title | Yesterday Today PDF eBook |
Author | Catherine S. Barker |
Publisher | University of Arkansas Press |
Pages | 268 |
Release | 2020-03-06 |
Genre | History |
ISBN | 1682261247 |
The emergence into pop culture of quaint and simple Ozarks Mountaineers—through the writings of Vance Randolph, Wayman Hogue, Charles Morrow Wilson, and others—was a comfort and fascination to many Americans in the early twentieth century. Disillusioned with the modernity they felt had contributed to the Great Depression, middle-class Americans admired the Ozarkers’ apparently simple way of life, which they saw as an alternative to an increasingly urban and industrial America. Catherine S. Barker's 1941 book Yesterday Today: Life in the Ozarks sought to illuminate another side of these “remnants of eighteenth-century life and culture”: poverty and despair. Drawing on her encounters and experiences as a federal social worker in the backwoods of the Ozarks in the 1930s, Barker described the mountaineers as “lovable and pathetic and needy and self-satisfied and valiant,” declaring that the virtuous and independent people of the hills deserved a better way and a more abundant life. Barker was also convinced that there were just as many contemptible facets of life in the Ozarks that needed to be replaced as there were virtues that needed to be preserved. This reprinting of Yesterday Today—edited and introduced by historian J. Blake Perkins—situates this account among the Great Depression-era chronicles of the Ozarks.
Broadcasting the Ozarks
Title | Broadcasting the Ozarks PDF eBook |
Author | Kitty Ledbetter |
Publisher | University of Arkansas Press |
Pages | 243 |
Release | 2024-04-15 |
Genre | Biography & Autobiography |
ISBN | 1610758196 |
“It’s good to see Si Siman and the Ozark Jubilee get their due in Broadcasting the Ozarks.” —Willie Nelson Broadcasting the Ozarks explores the vibrant country music scene that emerged in Springfield, Missouri, in the 1930s and thrived for half a century. Central to this history is the Ozark Jubilee (1955–60), the first regularly broadcast live country music show on network television. Dubbed the “king of the televised barn dances,” the show introduced the Ozarks to viewers across America and put Springfield in the running with Nashville for dominance of the country music industry—with the Jubilee’s producer, Si Siman, at the helm. Siman’s life story is almost as remarkable as the show he produced. He was booking Tommy Dorsey, Ella Fitzgerald, and Glenn Miller during the mid-1930s while still a high school student and produced nationally syndicated country music radio shows in the decades that followed. Siman was a promotional genius with an ear for talent, a persuasive gift for gab, and the energy and persistence to make things happen for many future Country Music Hall of Famers, including Chet Atkins, Porter Wagoner, the Browns, and Brenda Lee. Following the Jubilee’s five-year run, Siman had a hand in some of the greatest hits of the twentieth century as a music publisher, collaborating with such songwriters as rockabilly legend and fellow Springfieldian Ronnie Self, who wrote Brenda Lee’s signature hit, “I’m Sorry,” and Wayne Carson, who wrote Willie Nelson’s “Always on My Mind.” Although Siman had numerous opportunities to find success in bigger cities, he chose to do it all from his hometown in the Ozarks.
Newspaperwoman of the Ozarks
Title | Newspaperwoman of the Ozarks PDF eBook |
Author | Susan Croce Kelly |
Publisher | University of Arkansas Press |
Pages | 259 |
Release | 2023-08-07 |
Genre | Biography & Autobiography |
ISBN | 1682262367 |
"Newspaperwoman of the Ozarks is a long-overdue study of Lucile Morris Upton, one of the region's best-known reporters and local historians. A longtime reporter and columnist at Springfield Newspapers during a time when the remote Ozarks was reshaped from backcountry into a national vacation hub and the role of women in the United States shifted drastically, Upton not only reported on these rapidly changing times but also personified them in her own life. In this significant contribution to the historical research of Ozarkers' daily lives, author Susan Croce Kelly traces Upton's life, from teaching school to covering the news to governing her city and raising awareness for historic preservation, and paints a vivid picture of Ozarks culture over nearly a century of change"--
The Best of Colorado 4-wheel Drive Roads
Title | The Best of Colorado 4-wheel Drive Roads PDF eBook |
Author | Outdoor Books & Maps (Firm) |
Publisher | Adler Publishing |
Pages | 196 |
Release | 2007-05-31 |
Genre | Travel |
ISBN | 9780930657406 |
NEW for 2007. Find the best places to visit in Colorado's National Forests! Colorado 4-Wheel Drive Roads covers a range of roads from easy-going, scenic drives to technical 4-wheel drive trails over roacky terrain. Full of detailed maps, directions and vital trail information, this guide takes you off the paved roads and into Colorado's breathtaking backcountry. Includes 165 trails, perfect for exploring mountain passes, peaks, lakes, and historic sites without getting lost. Available now!
Diamonds in the Rough
Title | Diamonds in the Rough PDF eBook |
Author | James Sanders Day |
Publisher | University of Alabama Press |
Pages | 224 |
Release | 2013-06-24 |
Genre | Biography & Autobiography |
ISBN | 0817317945 |
Diamonds in the Rough reconstructs the historical moment that defined the Cahaba Coal Field, a mineral-rich area that stretches across sixty-seven miles and four counties of central Alabama. Combining existing written sources with oral accounts and personal recollections, James Sanders Day’s Diamonds in the Rough describes the numerous coal operations in this region—later overshadowed by the rise of the Birmingham district and the larger Warrior Field to the north. Many of the capitalists are the same: Truman H. Aldrich, Henry F. DeBardeleben, and James W. Sloss, among others; however, the plethora of small independent enterprises, properties of the coal itself, and technological considerations distinguish the Cahaba from other Alabama coal fields. Relatively short-lived, the Cahaba coal-mining operation spanned from discovery in the 1840s through development, boom, and finally bust in the mid-1950s. Day considers the chronological discovery, mapping, mining, and marketing of the field’s coal as well as the issues of convict leasing, town development, welfare capitalism, and unionism, weaving it all into a rich tapestry. At the heart of the story are the diverse people who lived and worked in the district—whether operator or miner, management or labor, union or nonunion, white or black, immigrant or native—who left a legacy for posterity now captured in Diamonds in the Rough. Largely obscured today by pine trees and kudzu, the mining districts of the Cahaba Coal Field forever influenced the lives of countless individuals and families, and ultimately contributed to the whole fabric of the state of Alabama. Winner of the 2014 Clinton Jackson Coley Award for Best Work on Alabama Local History from the Alabama Historical Association