Election Day: Go On the Stump at the Old State House

Twenty years ago, on Election Day 1992, the eyes of the world were on Little Rock.  That evening William Jefferson Clinton strode out through the front doors of the Old State House Museum and delivered his acceptance speech after being elected the 42nd President of the United States.

On this election day, you can visit the Old State House and visit the permanent exhibit they have on Clinton’s presidential announcement in 1991 and the election nights in 1992 and 1996.  You can also view the exhibit “On the Stump” which looks at campaigns in Arkansas from 1819 through 1919.

In 1819 when the Arkansas Territory was created, the elimination of property requirements for voting combined with the raucous spirit of the frontier produced a new style of mass participation in American politics. The results were crude and often vulgar, but thoroughly democratic. This manifested itself in Arkansas politics less centered on political parties of Arkansas and the ideology of citizens than on the personalities of those involved. So personal were the politics of the times that political campaigns often culminated in duels.  The exhibit was curated by Dr. Carl Moneyhon, Professor of History at UALR.

The Old State House is a museum of the Department of Arkansas Heritage.  It is open from 9am to 5pm Monday through Saturday and from 1pm to 5pm on Sunday.

 

Legacies and Lunch tomorrow

The Butler Center’s monthly “Legacies and Lunch” series continues tomorrow.

Wednesday, August 1, 2012, noon to 1 p.m.
Darragh Center, Main Library
100 Rock St.
The Civil War in Arkansas

In conjunction with the Butler Center exhibition Invasion or Liberation? The Civil War in Arkansas, Dr. Carl Moneyhon will discuss opposition to the Civil War in Arkansas. Moneyhon, a faculty member in the University of Arkansas at Little Rock history department, is a specialist in the history of the American Civil War and the South and is widely published in the field.

Invasion or Liberation? will be on view on Concordia Hall (401 President Clinton Ave.) through October 27, 2012. Legacies & Lunch is sponsored in part by the Arkansas Humanities Council. Bring a sack lunch; drinks and dessert are provided.

Dr. Moneyhon joined the faculty in 1973 and holds a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. He is faculty liaison with the University History Institute, an organization that develops closer ties between the department and the community. He also serves on the editorial boards of the Arkansas Historical Quarterly and the Encyclopedia of Arkansas History and Culture. He was won the UALR Faculty Excellent Award for Research and the UALR Faculty Excellence Award for Teaching.

Dr. Moneyhon is a specialist in the history of the American Civil War and the South and is widely published in the field. His work has been supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities, and he recently received one of the first College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences Summer Fellowships for Research. He is a Fellow of the Texas Historical Association. He is working on a book on the connection of war-time experience and developed identity among Confederate soldiers.

Arts & Humanities Month: UALR History Department’s Evenings with History

This year marks the 21st year for the History Institutes’ Evenings with History.  This nationally recognized series has featured a variety of subject.  This year, the first three evenings comprise a mini-series focused on African-Americans in Arkansas.  The other evenings will take listeners around the world in geography and chronology. The sessions take place at the Ottenheimer Auditorium of Historic Arkansas Museum. Refreshments are served at 7 with the program beginning at 7:30 pm. The cost is $50 for admission to all six programs.

Tonight’s program features Carl Moneyhon speaking on “Freedom: Black Arkansans and the End of Slavery”

On November 1, Story Matkin-Rawn of the UCA History Department will present a program entitled “From Land Ownership to Legal Defense: The World War I Watershed in Black Arkansan Organizing”

John Kirk presents December’s program on the 6th: “A Movement is more than a Moment: Arkansas and the African American Civil Rights struggle since 1940”

The Evenings in History return on February 7 with Jeff Kyong-McClain’s “The Heavenly History of the Han, or How a Liberal Baptist from Green Forest, Arkansas Taught Racial and Ethnic Nationalism to the Chinese”

On March 6, Charles Romney will address “A Brief History of Human Rights”

The 2011-2012 sessions will conclude on April 3 with Edward Anson’s “Counter-Insurgency: The Lessons of Alexander the Great”

The corporate sponsors for the 2011-2012 season are Delta Trust, Union Pacific Railroad, the Little Rock School District—Teaching American History Program; the law firms of  Friday, Eldredge & Clark and Wright, Lindsey & Jennings. Support and gifts in kind have been provided by the UALR Ottenheimer Library; Historic Arkansas Museum, a museum of the Department of Arkansas Heritage; UALR Public Radio–KLRE-KUAR; and Grapevine Spirits.