Gerstäcker's Louisiana
Gerstäcker's Louisiana

Author: Irene S. Di Maio

Publisher: LSU Press

Published: 2006-09-01

Total Pages: 343

ISBN-13: 0807131466

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A global traveler and adventurer, the German author Friedrich Gerstäcker (1816--1872) first arrived in Louisiana in March 1838, paddling the waterways leading from the wilds of the northwestern part of the state near Shreveport south to cosmopolitan New Orleans. He returned to the state in 1842, living for a year in the areas of Bayou Sara, St. Francisville, and Pointe Coupée -- then considered the most beautiful garden and plantation land along the Mississippi River. In 1867 he briefly visited Louisiana again, observing the devastation wrought by the Civil War and the turmoil of Reconstruction. No mere armchair tourist, Gerstäcker fully engaged himself in exploring Louisiana -- its landscapes, peoples, and Peculiar Institution. He was in the unique position of being both an insider and an outsider, and his sojourns in the state served as the basis for travel books, short stories, and novels. Gerstäcker was a remarkable raconteur and a highly popular author. During his lifetime and beyond, his writings conveyed the tenor of southern life to a German-speaking audience. Now, compiled and translated into English by Irene S. Di Maio, they offer a window on nineteenth-century Louisiana across several decades of growth and upheaval.Gerstäcker's aim as a writer was to inform and entertain, especially through humor, drama, and suspense. His works -- including his fiction -- sustain an almost ethnographic level of detail. The stories, travel sketches, and novel excerpts included here comment on slavery and its aftermath, ethnic and racial diversity, transcultural relations, and immigration and multilingualism. Gerstäcker's impressions of Louisiana remain relevant and deeply engaging

Arkansas Biography
Arkansas Biography

Author: Jeannie M. Whayne

Publisher: University of Arkansas Press

Published: 2000-01-01

Total Pages: 374

ISBN-13: 9781557285874

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Eight years in the making, Arkansas Biography brings to light the lives of those who have helped shape Arkansas history for over four hundred years. Featured are not only the trailblazers, such as steamboat captain Henry Shreve, Olympic gold medalist Bill Carr, discount mogul Sam Walton, and aviator Louise Thaden, but also those whose lives reflect their culture and times--musicians, scientists, teachers, preachers, and journalists. One hundred and eighty contributors--professional and avocational historians--offer clear vignettes of nearly three hundred individuals, beginning with Hernando de Soto, who crossed the Mississippi River in the summer of 1540. The entries include birth and death dates and places, life and career highlights, lineage, anecdotes, and source material. This is a browser's book with an Arkansas voice. The wealth of information condensed into this single reference volume will be valuable to general readers of all ages, libraries, museums, and scholars. A fitting summary at the turn of a millennium, Arkansas Biography pays lasting tribute to the men and women who have enriched the life and character of the state and, by extension, the region and the nation.

35 Degrees 24 Minutes North - 91 Degrees West
35 Degrees 24 Minutes North - 91 Degrees West

Author: Johnny H. Wilson

Publisher: Trafford Publishing

Published: 2006-07-18

Total Pages: 572

ISBN-13: 1412221862

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A history of the settlement and development of the townships of Brushy Lake and Hickory Ridge and of the emergence of the town of Hickory ridge, all located within the state of Arkansas. The time span covered begins with the discovery of America and comes forth to about the year 2000. It includes such events as DeSoto's trek through the area, transfer of ownership via the Louisiana Purchase, regional exploration and surveying, territorial politics and gaining the status of statehood. Following the time of the Civil War, the narrative focuses more on the development of Cross County, the two townships of Brushy Lake and Hickory Ridge and, finally, on the town of hickory Ridge. A history of some of the region's schools, churches, and cemeteries is included as well as several maps, some as early as 1819, a full record of Cross County post offices, Peace Court Records from the early part of the 20th century, and many random photographs.

Fugitivism
Fugitivism

Author: S. Charles Bolton

Publisher: University of Arkansas Press

Published: 2019-08-22

Total Pages: 314

ISBN-13: 1682260992

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Winner, 2020 Booker Worthen Literary Prize During the antebellum years, over 750,000 enslaved people were taken to the Lower Mississippi Valley, where two-thirds of them were sold in the slave markets of New Orleans, Natchez, and Memphis. Those who ended up in Louisiana found themselves in an environment of swamplands, sugar plantations, French-speaking creoles, and the exotic metropolis of New Orleans. Those sold to planters in the newly-opened Mississippi Delta cleared land and cultivated cotton for owners who had moved west to get rich as quickly as possible, driving this labor force to harsh extremes. Like enslaved people all over the South, those in the Lower Mississippi Valley left home at night for clandestine parties or religious meetings, sometimes “laying out” nearby for a few days or weeks. Some of them fled to New Orleans and other southern cities where they could find refuge in the subculture of slaves and free blacks living there, and a few attempted to live permanently free in the swamps and forests of the surrounding area. Fugitives also tried to returnto eastern slave states to rejoin families from whom they had been separated. Some sought freedom on the northern side of the Ohio River; othersfled to Mexico for the same purpose. Fugitivism provides a wealth of new information taken from advertisements, newspaper accounts, and court records. It explains how escapees made use of steamboat transportation, how urban runaways differed from their rural counterparts, how enslaved people were victimized by slave stealers, how conflicts between black fugitives and the white people who tried to capture them encouraged a culture of violence in the South, and how runaway slaves from the Lower Mississippi Valley influenced the abolitionist movement in the North. Readers will discover that along with an end to oppression, freedom-seeking slaves wanted the same opportunities afforded to most Americans.

Wild Sports
Wild Sports

Author: Friedrich Gerstacker

Publisher: Stackpole Books

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 484

ISBN-13: 9780811731744

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An exciting first-hand account of an early deer hunter's explorations of the unspoiled American wilderness Voyages from New York, through Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri, and as far south as Louisiana. Gerstacker arrived in America from Germany in 1837, drawn by stories he had heard of the immense forests, excellent for deer hunting. He wandered from Buffalo to New Orleans, visiting frontiersmen in their backwoods cabins and living off the land, eating venison, acorns, sassafras leaves, and wild honey. He found Arkansas ideal for hunting, and encountered all sorts of wildlife, including alligators, wolves, bears, and deer, in his travels. His hunting journal gives a fascinating look at the early-nineteenth century American landscape.