The history of Arkansas is richly detailed in this book as a
meeting place for every great change in US history. It’s a humorous story,
because some of the supposedly Native American names are actually corruptions
of French ones. The French trappers were here before the English speaking
settlers, but they were merely after the furs and not interested in farming the
land, so they left few marks. Arkansas was a perfect trading post because it
sat where two rivers met, and the Natives would trade furs and smoked buffalo
meat (ribs were especially popular) for cloth, tools, and weapons.
!830-1865 was a turbulent era, thanks to Indian Removal and
then the Civil War. In between were years of violent conflict between pro and
anti-slavery forces. Even after the was was over there was conflict between
black and white laborers for jobs on the plantations. Freed slaves and their
descendants crowded into Little Rock because they were safe from attacks by
white mobs, while in the country they were scattered and vulnerable. If
Arkansas weren’t the meeting place for major rivers, it probably wouldn’t have
much of a history.
Up into the 1950’s it would be the scene of even more famous
change, like the Little Rock Nine in 1957, Bill Clinton, Creation v Evolution,
Pro-Choice v Pro-Life. Arkansas’ geographic position is no longer as important
as it used to be, but it will always be a lynchpin for US history.
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