The Presbyterian Church in the Old Southwest, 1778-1838


Book Description

"Fully documented account of the events of this era---of the Great Revival, of missionary work among the Indians, of the development of education, and of the church's stand on the slavery question."--Dust jacket flap.










Old Southwest to Old South


Book Description

Mississippi’s foundational epoch—in which the state literally took shape—has for too long remained overlooked and shrouded in misunderstanding. Yet the years between 1798, when the Mississippi Territory was created, and 1840, when the maturing state came into its own as arguably the heart of the antebellum South, was one of remarkable transformation. Beginning as a Native American homeland subject to contested claims by European colonial powers, the state became a thoroughly American entity in the span of little more than a generation. In Old Southwest to Old South: Mississippi, 1798–1840, authors Mike Bunn and Clay Williams tell the story of Mississippi’s founding era in a sweeping narrative that gives these crucial years the attention they deserve. Several key themes, addressing how and why the state developed as it did, rise to the forefront in the book’s pages. These include a veritable list of the major issues in Mississippi history: a sudden influx of American settlers, the harsh saga of Removal, the pivotal role of the institution of slavery, and the consequences of heavy reliance on cotton production. The book bears witness to Mississippi’s birth as the twentieth state in the Union, and it introduces a cast of colorful characters and events that demand further attention from those interested in the state’s past. A story of relevance to all Mississippians, Old Southwest to Old South explains how Mississippi’s early development shaped the state and continues to define it today.




The Fleming Lectures, 1937--1990


Book Description

As a quintessentially southern campus, Louisiana State University has logically spawned some of the most important regional scholarly studies of the twentieth century. During the campus' golden age in the 1930s, such eminent scholars as Cleanth Brooks, Robert Penn Warren, and Eric Voeglin made LSU one of the leading academic institutions in the country. It was during this period that a series called the Walter Lynwood Fleming Lectures in Southern History, named in honor of a noted scholar and researcher at LSU in the early 1900s, was created to add to the body of knowledge in the developing field of southern history.Now considered one of the most distinguished lecture series of its kind, the Fleming series has brought to the LSU campus scholars of note who have studied the South in its various aspects. Lecturers ranging from C. Vann Woodward and Lewis P. Simpson to Eric Foner and Drew Gilpin Faust have presented a wide panorama of views and methodological approaches. In this book Burl Noggle presents an informative history of the lectures from 1937 through 1990.As a member of the LSU history faculty for more than thirty years, Noggle has heard most of the Fleming lectures delivered and has participated in the selection of lecturers. He thus brings a rather special perspective to his subject -- that of an insider who has been intimately involved in the series itself -- as well as the broader understanding of a mature scholar who has devoted a substantial portion of his career to the analysis of American historiography.Noggle focuses on two aspects of the Fleming series. On one level, he discusses the history of the lectures themselves -- who lectured on what topic, why each lecturer was chose, what general historiographical trends prevailed at the time, and how each speaker's lectures were related to scholarly currents within the profession. On another level, Noggle discusses just what the lecturers said about southern history and how they contributed to, qualified, refuted, or revised existing conceptions about southern history. The Fleming Lectures, 1937--1990 is, therefore, both a history of the lecture series and an analysis of the history contained in the lectures.




The Appalachian Frontier


Book Description

John A. Caruso’s The Appalachian Frontier is a stirring drama of the beginnings of American westward expansion. It traces the advance of the frontier in the area between the Ohio and Tennessee rivers and the development of the American character—those attitudes toward personal liberty and dignity that have come to epitomize our national ideal. The Appalachian Frontier is no mere catalog of facts; it is a recreation of life. Not until about 1650, more than a generation after the first English settlements were established on the eastern coast, did organized bands of white explorers, hunters and fur trappers venture very far into the trackless back country claimed by the British Crown. Beginning with those earliest scouting parties The Appalachian Frontier presses with the pioneers past the Fall Line and the pine barrens into the Piedmont of Virginia, on through gaps in the Blue Ridge Mountains to the Great Valley of the Appalachians, through the Great Valley to the jagged peaks of the Allegheny Front and, finally, over those peaks into the rich country of Kentucky and Tennessee. As the frontiersman advances he discovers that the rules prevailing in the European-dominated eastern settlements do not apply in his new situation. Thus we see him formulate the rudiments of a law of his own. As his life grows more complex, he frames compacts and, finally; constitutions peculiarly adapted to the exigencies of frontier living. We are present at the inception of the fluid democracy that later engulfed the more stable coastal colonies and ultimately came to characterize the government of the United States. The story closes, quite properly, with the admission of Tennessee into the Union in 1796. In John A. Caruso’s bright, informal, sometimes almost racy telling of the tale, historical personages emerge as real people whose triumphs and heartaches we share, with whose deficiencies and inadequacies we sympathize, and in whose hours of nobility we rejoice.




The Growth of the American Thought


Book Description

Hailed as a pioneer achievement upon its original publi-cation and awarded the Pulitzer Prize in history in 1944, The Growth of American Thought has won appreciative reviews and earned the highest regard among historians of the national experience. With his elaboration of the complex interrelationships between the growth of American thought and the whole American social milieu, Curti creates not only an intellectual history, but a social history of American thought.




Red Book


Book Description

" ... provides updated county and town listings within the same overall state-by-state organization ... information on records and holdings for every county in the United States, as well as excellent maps from renowned mapmaker William Dollarhide ... The availability of census records such as federal, state, and territorial census reports is covered in detail ... Vital records are also discussed, including when and where they were kept and how"--Publisher decription.




The American South


Book Description

In The American South: A History, Fourth Edition, William J. Cooper, Jr. and Thomas E. Terrill demonstrate their belief that it is impossible to divorce the history of the South from the history of the United States. The authors' analysis underscores the complex interaction between the South as a distinct region and the South as an inescapable part of America. Cooper and Terrill show how the resulting tension has often propelled section and nation toward collision. In supporting their thesis, the authors draw on the tremendous amount of profoundly new scholarship in Southern history. Each volume includes a substantial biographical essay—completely updated for this edition—which provides the reader with a guide to literature on the history of the South. Coverage now includes the devastation of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, up-to-date analysis of the persistent racial divisions in the region, and the South's unanticipated role in the 2008 presidential primaries.




The Great Revival


Book Description

Drawing upon the religious writings of southern evangelicals, John Boles asserts that the extraordinary crowds and miraculous transformations that distinguished the South's First Great Awakening were not simply instances of emotional excess but the expression of widespread and complex attitudes toward God. Converted southerners were starkly individualistic, interested more in gaining personal salvation in a hopelessly evil world than in improving society. As Boles shows in this landmark study, the effect of the Revival was to throw over the region a conservative cast that remains dominant in contemporary southern thought and life.