Arkansas: A Concise History

About

Distilled from Arkansas: A Narrative History, the definitive work on the subject since its original publication in 2002, Arkansas: A Concise History is a succinct one-volume history of the state from the prehistory period to the present. Featuring four historians, each bringing his or her expertise to a range of topics, this volume introduces readers to the major issues that have confronted the state and traces the evolution of those issues across time.

After a brief review of Arkansas’s natural history, readers will learn about the state’s native populations before exploring the colonial and plantation eras, early statehood, Arkansas’s entry into and role in the Civil War, and significant moments in national and global history, including Reconstruction, the Gilded Age, the Progressive Era, the Elaine race massacre, the Great Depression, both world wars, and the Civil Rights Movement. Linking these events together, Arkansas: A Concise History offers both an understanding of the state’s history and a perspective on that history’s implications for the political, economic, and social realities of today.

Authors

Jeannie M. Whayne is university professor at the University of Arkansas. She is the author of Delta Empire: Lee Wilson and the Transformation of Agriculture in the New South and A New Plantation South: Land, Labor, and Federal Favor in Twentieth Century Arkansas.

Thomas A. DeBlack is retired professor of history at Arkansas Tech University. He is the author of With Fire and Sword: Arkansas, 1861–1874.

George Sabo III is professor of anthropology at the University of Arkansas and director of the Arkansas Archeological Survey. His publications include Rock Art in Arkansas and Paths of Our Children: Historic Indians of Arkansas.

Morris S. Arnold is a United States Circuit Judge for the Eighth Circuit. He is the author of Colonial Arkansas, 1686–1804: A Social and Cultural History and The Rumble of a Distant Drum: The Quapaws and Old World Newcomers, 1673–1804.

Contents

1. A Land “Inferior to None”
2. Ancient Native Americans
3. First Encounters: European Explorers Meet Arkansas Indians
4. Indians and Colonists in the Arkansas Country, 1686–1803
5. The Turbulent Path to Statehood: Arkansas Territory, 1803–1836
6. “The Rights and Rank to Which We Are Entitled”: Arkansas in the Early Statehood Period
7. Prosperity and Peril: Arkansas in the Late Antebellum Period
8. “Between the Hawk & Buzzard”: The Civil War in Arkansas
9. “A Harnessed Revolution”: Reconstruction in Arkansas
10. Arkansas in the New South, 1880–1900
11. A Light in the Darkness: Limits of Progressive Reform, 1900–1932
12. Darker Forces on the Horizon: The Great Depression and World War II, 1932–1945
13. From World War to New Era, 1945–1960
14. Arkansas in the Sunbelt South, 1960–1992
15. The Burden of Arkansas History, 1992–2012
Suggested Reading
Index

Adoption

Adopted at: National Park College
Course: HIST 1143 Arkansas History
Course Description: Designed to acquaint the student with the economic, social and political evolutions of Arkansas from the Spanish and French explorations to the present. “Local color” interrelated to these socio-economic studies will be an integral part of the course: folklore, native art and music, and traditions that have remained a unique part of Arkansas heritage.
Professor: Thomas Copeland
Term: Spring 2021

Adopted at: Harding University
Course: HIST 3021 and HIST 5021 Arkansas History
Course Description: A survey of the history of Arkansas from the era of European exploration to the present. Required of all teachers certifying in the social sciences.
Professor: Jared Dockery
Term: Spring 2021