William A. Link is Richard J. Milbauer Chair in Southern History Emeritus at the University of Florida. This interview is based on his new book, The Last Fire-Eater: Roger A. Pryor and the Search for a Southern Identity (LSU Press,...
southern history
William Tecumseh Sherman: emancipator of the enslaved
Here is historian Bennett Parten at Zocalo Public Square: Americans get Sherman’s March all wrong. Ask anyone who’s seen Gone with the Wind, and they’ll tell you that U.S. General William T. Sherman’s roughly 250-mile march from Atlanta to Savannah marked...
The Author’s Corner with Patrick Luck
Patrick Luck is Assistant Professor of History at Florida Polytechnic University. This interview is based on his new book, Replanting a Slave Society: The Sugar and Cotton Revolutions in the Lower Mississippi Valley (University of Virginia Press, 2022). JF: What...
Eric Foner on C. Vann Woodward
Over at London Review of Books, Columbia University Eric Foner reviews James Cobb’s new biography of C. Vann Woodward. It is a fascinating review. Here is a taste: As he approached retirement, Woodward entered what one former student called his...
The Author’s Corner with Trent Brown
Trent Brown is Professor of American Studies at Missouri University of Science and Technology. This interview is based on his new book, Roadhouse Justice: Hattie Lee Barnes and the Killing of a White Man in 1950s Mississippi (LSU Press, 2022)....
The Author’s Corner with Rebecca Sharpless
Rebecca Sharpless is Professor of History at Texas Christian University. This interview is based on her new book, Grain and Fire: A History of Baking in the American South (University of North Carolina Press, 2022). JF: What led you to...
The Author’s Corner with Brad R. Clampitt
Brad R. Clampitt is Professor of History at East Central University. This interview is based on his new book, Lost Causes: Confederate Demobilization and the Making of Veteran Identity (LSU Press, 2022). JF: What led you to write Lost Causes?...
The Author’s Corner with Brendan J. J. Payne
Brendan J. J. Payne is Assistant Professor of History and Chair of the Department of History at North Greenville University. This interview is based on his new book, Gin, Jesus, and Jim Crow: Prohibition and the Transformation of Racial and...
Bringing the Bible to the Jim Crow South
In 1900, Henry Nelson Payne, a missionary and president of Mary Holmes Seminary in West Point, Mississippi, a school for Black women, was frustrated that many Bible societies in the former Confederacy were not willing to distribute Bibles to African...
Episode 89: The Heretical John C. Calhoun
John C. Calhoun is among the most notorious and enigmatic figures in American political history. In this episode we talk with Robert Elder, author of Calhoun: American Heretic. Elder shows that Calhoun’s story is crucial for understanding the political climate in...
Episode 85: Reckoning with Confederate Monuments
Historian Karen L. Cox argues that “when it comes to Confederate monuments, there is no common ground.” In this episode, we talk with Cox about the history of Confederate monuments and how the recent racial unrest in the United States...
Some resources on the Tulsa Race Massacre
Today marks the 100th anniversary of the start of the Tulsa Race Massacre. If you are unfamiliar with this tragic event in American history, start here. If you want to go deeper, here are some pieces from the last few...
A 107-year-old survivor of the Tulsa Race Massacre testified before Congress
Here is NPR’s “All Things Considered”: The day that a white mob came to Greenwood Avenue in Tulsa, Okla., Viola Fletcher was just 7 years old. During emotional testimony on Capitol Hill on Wednesday, Fletcher, who is now 107, recalled...