Monthly Archives: September 2013

“A Land Inferior to None” – an evening celebrating “Arkansas: A Narrative History”

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The Old State House Museum will present “A Land Inferior to None,” a talk and book signing with Jeannie Whayne, George Sabo and Tom DeBlack, authors of “Arkansas: A Narrative History,” Second Edition, on Tuesday, September 24, from 6 to 8 p.m. Admission to the talk is free. Those who wish to attend are encouraged to RSVP by calling (501) 324-8641 or visiting www.oldstatehouse.com/RSVP.

Deblack, Gatewood, Whayne, and Sabo

Deblack, Gatewood, Whayne, and Sabo

The book is a comprehensive state history that has been invaluable to students and the general public since its original publication over 10 years ago. The original edition won the Arkansiana Award when it was published in 2002, and the book is widely used in colleges throughout the state. The new edition has been updated and expanded with three additional chapters, including a new chapter on Arkansas geography. It also covers fresh material on the civil rights movement in the state and the struggle over integration, a new analysis of Arkansas’s school-funding issues and an examination of the Natural State’s transition from colonialism to its entry into the global political economy. The University of Arkansas Press published both editions of the award-winning textbook.

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

Tom DeBlack is professor of history at Arkansas Tech University. He is the author of “With Fire and Sword: Arkansas, 1861-1874.”

George Sabo 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.”

The Old State House Museum is a program of the Department of Arkansas Heritage.  Bill Gatewood is the Director of the Museum.  Martha Miller is the Director of the Department of Arkansas Heritage.

Arkansas Sounds: Singer Songwriter Showcase

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arkansas_sounds_2013Later this week music stages downtown will be filled with three days of music as part of the 2nd annual Arkansas Sounds  music festival.

The week kicks off tonight with a Singer Songwriter Showcase.

Featuring local members of the Nashville Songwriters Association International (Steve Smith, Russellville; Jim Pollock, Conway; Rodger King with Molly Brockinton, Lonoke; Roy Hayle, Malvern) and a special performance by Arkansas songwriter Wood Newton.

The program will start tonight at 6pm at the Darragh Center of the Main Library.

The Butler Center for Arkansas Studies, a department of the Central Arkansas Library System (CALS), sponsors the annual Arkansas Sounds Music Festival.

Focused on Arkansas music and musicians both past and present, the Festival also works to get musicians and songwriters involved in local schools, with songwriting workshops for kids and adults, and related performances and events throughout the state.

Banned Books Week Kicks Off with CLOCKWORK DOLL

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ALA Freadom Slide 2013 (2)Banned Books Week started in 1982 because a librarian remembered being a twelve-year-old caught reading with a flashlight under her covers, and her mother telling her to turn the light on while she was reading so she wouldn’t hurt her eyes.

The Central Arkansas Library System (CALS) will celebrate the freedom to read, the importance of First Amendment rights, and the power of literature with special events and displays during Banned Books Week, September 22-28. CALS’s celebration of Banned Books Week is sponsored by the Fred K. Darragh Jr. Foundation, and will include the Arkansas Literary Festival’s collaboration with The Weekend Theater of Clockwork Doll on Sunday, September 22, at 6:30 p.m. at The Weekend Theater, 1001 W. 7th Street.

This one-night only collage features scenes from two plays: Nora, an adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House; and a stage version of the dystopian novella A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess. Both works of literature have been banned or challenged, and are part of The Weekend Theater’s fall season. A brief reception will follow the presentation, which is free and open to the public. Seating is open and reservations are requested, but not required, at pedwards@cals.org or 918-3009. There are a limited number of seats, so patrons are urged to arrive early. For more information on Clockwork Doll visit www.arkansasliteraryfestival.org or call (501) 918-3098.  

Banned Books Week stresses the importance of ensuring the availability of all viewpoints, even those which may be unorthodox or unpopular, for all who wish to read and access them; and recognizes the danger that exists when restraints are imposed on the availability of information in a free society. Each year, many books are challenged and/or banned in communities across the United States. In a majority of cases the books are not banned, thanks to the efforts of librarians, teachers, booksellers, and members of the community to retain the books in the library collections.

A challenge is an attempt to remove or restrict materials, based upon the objections of a person or group; a ban is the removal of challenged materials. Often challenges are motivated by a desire to protect children and youth from ideas and information that may be difficult for them to understand. Although this is a commendable motivation, the Library Bill of Rights states that, “Librarians and governing bodies should maintain that parents-and only parents-have the right and the  responsibility to restrict the access of their children-and only their children-to library resources.”

 

About the Arkansas Literary Festival

The Arkansas Literary Festival, the state’s premier gathering of readers and writers, will feature more than 80 bestselling and emerging authors April 24-27, 2014. The eleventh annual event will feature a stimulating mix of sessions, panels, workshops, activities, performances, special events, and book signings.

 

About The Weekend Theater

The Weekend Theater, a non-profit theatrical community that produces socially significant plays for the Central Arkansas community, will produce both full length plays in the fall. Performance dates for Nora are October 4, 5, 11, 12, 18, and 19; and A Clockwork Orange runs November 1, 2, 8, 9, 15, and 16. For information about the full productions or to purchase tickets visit www.weekendtheater.org or call (501) 374-3761.

About CALS

CALS libraries in Little Rock include: Main Library, 100 Rock Street; Hillary Rodham Clinton Children’s Library and Learning Center, 4800 W. 10th Street; Dee Brown Library, 6325 Baseline Road; Fletcher Library, 823 North Buchanan Street; Oley E. Rooker Library, 11 Otter Creek Court; Terry Library, 2015 Napa Valley Drive; Thompson Library, 38 Rahling Circle; Williams Library, 1800 Chester Street; and McMath Library, 2100 John Barrow Road. CALS libraries in surrounding communities include: Millie M. Brooks Library, 13024 Hwy. 365, Wrightsville; Maumelle Library, 10 Lake Pointe Drive, Maumelle; Max Milam Library, 609 Aplin Avenue, Perryville; Esther D. Nixon Library, 703 W. Main Street, Jacksonville; and Amy Sanders Library, 31 Shelby Drive, Sherwood.

For more information, contact 918-3000.

Little Rock Look Back: City Government Closes Up

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Final 1863 minutesOn September 21, 1863, the City of Little Rock government shut down.  Following the occupation of Little Rock by federal troops (on September 10, 1863), the city was now under control of the United States Army.

The City Council met on September 21 and voted to disband the police force and to suspend the collection of taxes.  Mayor William E. Ashley was not present.  The five aldermen present were Charles P. Bertrand (a former mayor and stepson of Little Rock’s first mayor Dr. Matthew Cunningham), S. H. Tucker, W. B. Wait, I . A. Henry, and Louis George.  Following the actions regarding the police and taxes, the council adjourned.

The month before, on August 24, 1863, the City’s funds were “placed in the hands of a reliable party that was well known to the Council.”  Records in City Hall do not indicate who that was or if those funds were ever returned following the war. (Or if those funds were in Confederate dollars which would have been rendered useless.)

Following the September 21, 1863 meeting, there was not a City Council meeting until January 8, 1866.  I. A. Henry, who had been at the final 1863 City Council meeting was also an alderman on January 8, 1866.

Martina Filjak, piano with the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra this weekend

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ASO_2-colorThe Arkansas Symphony Orchestra will perform with charismatic pianist Martina Filjak, on Saturday, September 21 at 8:00 p.m. and Sunday, September 22 at 3:00 p.m. at the Robinson Center Music Hall. This is kicks off the ASO’s 2013-2014 Stella Boyle Smith Masterworks Series.

The program includes Shostakovich’s Festive Overture; Op. 96; Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-Flat Minor, Op. 23 and Stravinksy’s Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring).

The ASO will be under the baton of Music Director Philip Mann.

One of the most exciting young artists to emerge in recent years, Martina Filjak is garnering international praise for her poetic passion and technical mastery at the keyboard as well as for her charismatic personality and magnetic stage presence. Her transition from prodigy to mature artist has been all the more remarkable against the backdrop of political maelstrom that defined her native Croatia during her childhood.

Martina’s unwavering hunger for music, nurtured by piano teacher parents, has been her lodestar. Civil strife or no, she graduated from the Zagreb Music Academy and subsequently from the Vienna Conservatory and the soloist’s class at Hannover’s Hochschule für Musik. She participated in masterclasses at the Como Piano Academy, where she was coached by Dmitri Bashkirov, Peter Frankl and Andreas Staier.

In 2009, Martina Filjak won first prize in the Cleveland International Piano Competition, following which she made concerto debuts at the Konzerthaus Berlin and Vienna’s Musikverein and her recital debut at New York’s Carnegie Hall/Zankel Hall (“Brilliant, sensitive and imaginative playing with resourcefulness of technique and naturalness of musicality. …A striking individuality …A pianist to watch” The New York Times). Prior to winning the Cleveland competition, she had been first prizewinner of the 2007 Viotti International Piano Competition in Italy and the 2008 Maria Canals International Piano Competition in Barcelona.

She loves to travel and speaks seven languages.

LR Look Back: Fifty Years of Desegregated Downtown Little Rock

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widget_2013commerationThe UALR Institute on Race and Ethnicity is partnering with the Little Rock Regional Chamber of Commerce to mark the 50th anniversary of the desegregation of downtown Little Rock businesses from 10:30 a.m. – 2 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 21, 2013, at the Chamber.

This event is part of the Chamber’s 31st Annual Minority Enterprise Development Week and will include a public unveiling of the markers, reception, and the seminar, “Developing Future Leaders: How Strong Mentors Can Increase Diversity in Leadership Positions.”

Eleven  individuals from the Council on Community Affairs, Downtown Negotiating Committee, and Philander Smith College, will be honored with bronze markers placed on the Arkansas Civil Rights Heritage Trail in front of the Chamber. This will mark the third year of the Civil Rights Heritage Commemoration.

In 1963, this diverse group made up of members from COCA, DNC, and students from Philander Smith College worked together to plan a peaceful integration of downtown retail and restaurant establishments. Because of their efforts and others, by the end of 1963 most of the downtown retail businesses and restaurants had integrated.

2013 Arkansas Civil Rights Heritage Trail Honorees
The following individuals will be honored:

    • Dr. Garman P. Freeman, COCA
    • Dr. Morris A. Jackson, COCA
    • William Starr Mitchell, DNC
    • James H. Penick, DNC
    • Arthur Phillips, DNC
    • Rev. Negail Riley, Pastor, Wesley Chapel at Philander Smith College; COCA
    • Bert Strauss, Philander Smith College student; DNC
    • Ozell Sutton, COCA
    • Dr. William H. Townsend, COCA
    • Dr. Evangeline Upshur, COCA
    • B. Finley Vinson, DNC

Public Commemoration Ceremony – 10:30 a.m.
Civil Rights Heritage Markers Unveiling

Reception – 11 a.m.

Little Rock Look Back: Mayor John Elliott Knight

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Jno E Knight sigOn September 20, 1816, future Little Rock Mayor John Elliott Knight was born in Newburyport, Massachusetts. In 1843 he married Hannah Donnell in New York, and came to Little Rock that same year.

Knight was editor of the Arkansas Democrat from 1846 to 1850. He was also associated with the Arkansas Gazette and published the short-lived Chronicle. In 1851, Knight served as Mayor of Little Rock. In 1855, he served as a member of the City Council.

In 1858 a song was published entitled “I Am Near to Thee” which featured music by Arkansan Benjamin Scull and lyrics by Knight.  The song was dedicated to Mary Woodruff.

During the Civil War, he served as a Colonel.  During the 1850, 1860 and 1880 census, he was listed as an attorney.

He had one daughter, Elizabeth Knight, who married James S. Pollock, a banker in Little Rock. Knight died in Little Rock, Arkansas, on October 28, 1901, and was buried in Mount Holly Cemetery. Elizabeth Knight Pollock died in 1910.

As an attorney and newspaper editor, John E. Knight collected documents about the settlement of Little Rock. Those papers are now part of a collection at the Arkansas History Commission.  The majority of these papers are from William Russell to Chester Ashley, pertaining to pre-emption claims in and around Little Rock. Other material concerns the 1819-1822 dispute related to the the New Madrid Certificate and pre-emption claims of James Bryant, Stephen F. Austin, and William M. O’Hara.