Ohio History Journal

BOOK REVIEWS

 

 

Indian Arts in North America. By George C. Vaillant. (New

York and London, Harper & Brothers, 1939. 63p. ⁹⁶pl.,

$5.00.)

This book is essentially a volume of plates illustrating the

arts of the North American Indians. Each of the ninety-six

plates is a photograph of an actual specimen from either a pre-

historic or historic Indian group. The illustrations were selected

with three factors in mind, "the tribal style, the potential interest

to a modern audience, and the susceptibility of the specimens

to photographic reproduction." Many individuals and institutions

cooperated in assembling the photographs under the general su-

pervision of Mr. Vaillant.

In the seven short chapters which accompany the plates the

author describes the racial, cultural and environmental background

of the Indian tribes whose works are illustrated. He traces the

movements of peoples from Asia to the New World and points

out that the diversity of art in North America may be attributed to

the immigration of diverse groups into various geographical areas.

He states that art reached its greatest development among seden-

tary groups who had a sufficient food supply.

In Chapter V the author discusses Indian art that was pro-

duced before contact with white men. The Eskimo excelled in

making practical objects and their ivory carvings and masks were

in a way by-products of their good craftsmanship. The North-

west Coast tribes made some stone figures. In California, bas-

ketry was the principal art. The lack of art among the plains

tribes is attributed to the fact that they were nomadic. In the

northeastern area among an agricultural people art was rather

highly developed. The art of this area is typified by the fine

Hopewell tobacco pipes made in the images of animals. The

tribes of the southeastern area surpassed all others in ceramic

(84)

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BOOK REVIEWS                      85

arts and the working of shell. The southwestern peoples had a

high development in weaving and pottery making.

The next chapter is taken up with a description of Indian

art after white contact. In the pueblo area there has been a con-

tinuity in pottery making, there is some painting and masked

dancers, or kachinas, are carved.  Among the Navajos, rug

weaving is important and there is silver working and sand-paint-

ing. In the Southeast the cultures disintegrated too rapidly with

the coming of Europeans for art forms to survive. This is also

true in the main for the northeastern tribes. In the Plains area

the introduction of the horse and the amassing of great personal

wealth created an elaborate development of dress and objects of

adornment. In the California area the basket-making art con-

tinued. In the Northwest Coast region the richest art developed

after white contact. This took the form of wood-carving. Totem

poles, carved boxes and other objects were fashioned with great

skill following highly conventionalized designs. The Eskimo con-

tinued to carve in bone and ivory.

The concluding chapter summarizes the art achievements of

the American Indian and appraises it in a general way. Vaillant

states that "encouragement of Indian decoration and art might

make just such an integrating force as would enable Indian com-

munities to change from their present condition of being complete

almoners. The Indian's arts, too, should be a background to the

creation of a national art. At present, save for the survivals of

Indian culture in the Southwest and for some heroic attempts

made by governmental agencies to revive Indian arts elsewhere,

our native American heritage is being allowed to disintegrate."

The book possesses a cultural time chart and a map showing

house types and food animals of various areas. In addition to

the table of contents and list of plates there is a selected bib-

liography. The plates are well-executed, and due to the nature

of the book no index is needed.

R. G. M.

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Lewis Evans. By Lawrence Henry Gipson. (Philadelphia, His-

torical Society of Pennsylvania, 1939. ²⁴⁶p. Maps. $7.50.)

It is not necessary to discuss the importance of the car-

tographer. He has always been indispensable both in the making

and in the relating of history. And among the greatest of the

American cartographers the name of Lewis Evans holds a high

place. Mr. Gipson shows that Evans was a scientist and a poli-

tician in addition to being a map maker, but it seems likely that

he will continue to be remembered chiefly for his maps.

Lewis Evans was born about 1700 in Wales. What he did

for thirty-six years after that date we may never know, but he

turned up in Pennsylvania in 1736, connected in some way with

Benjamin Franklin. His life comes more clearly into focus in the

few years following, first as a surveyor and draughtsman and

amateur naturalist--the friend of Peter Collinson of England and

John Bartram of Pennsylvania and acquaintance of Peter Kalm.

Next he is a lecturer on electricity and associate of Franklin.

Then we see him as the cartographer and, finally, the man of

affairs. Just before his death in 1756 he was involved in a con-

troversy with Governor Morris of Pennsylvania over the proper

policy of the British Government in its contest with France which

landed him in jail in New York. Evans thought the English

should spend more energy in the Ohio Valley and less in Canada.

The Pennsylvania Historical Society has made a fine book

of Lewis Evans. Paper, form, and typography are beautiful. The

author has been forced to spread his facts thin to make a big

book, but that seems not to have been his fault but owing to the

dearth of sources. The last half of the volume consists of a re-

print of Lewis Evans' Brief Account of Pennsylvania . . . pub-

lished first in 1753 and a facsimile of his Geographical, Historical,

Political, Philosophical and Mechanical Essays . . . Numbers I and

II, published in 1755 and 1756. The book also contains repro-

ductions of Evans' "A Map of Pensilvania, New-Jersey, New-

York and the Three Delaware Counties" (1749); a revised copy

of the same map (1749); "Pensilvaniae, Novae-Caesareae,  Novi-

Eboraci, Aquanishuonigae, et Canadae . . ." (1750); "A Map of

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BOOK REVIEWS                      87

 

the Area in dispute between Pennsylvania and Maryland" (1753);

and "A general map of the Middle British Colonies, in Amer-

ica . . ." (1755). The last was Evans' most famous map and

was pirated and copied for fifty years.

Lewis Evans is a valuable reference tool and an interesting

story of the intrigue and excitement that form the more colorful

side of the life of a cartographer.

K. W. M.

 

 

India Rubber Man; the Story of Charles Goodyear. By Ralph F.

Wolf.   (Caldwell, Idaho, Caxton Printer's, 1939.  291p.

$3.00).

Rubber, now indispensable to modern living, was known

to the white man for several hundred years, but was practically

useless because of its characteristic of becoming iron-hard when

cold and soft and sticky when warm. With the discovery of the

process of vulcanization, rubber could be made to retain its elas-

tic, resilient quality and at the same time be made stronger and

easier to use in the manufacture of a multitude of articles.

After years of patient work, when not in the debtors' prison.

Goodyear in 1839 discovered the principles involved in vulcan-

ization. But this discovery was far from being the climax in his

long struggle with rubber. Though he had solved the rubber

problem, no one else believed it and the losses which manufac-

turers and investors had suffered up to that time in efforts to

use unvulcanized rubber made the sale of the idea almost fruit-

less. In 1844, ten years after he had first begun his experiments

and five years after the actual discovery of vulcanization, Good-

year received a patent for the process. He never benefited from

the discovery in either England or France but even with those

markets lost he might have made millions in the United States

had it not been for his carelessness in handling money and the

sharp business men and manufacturers with whom he did busi-

ness.

Half of the volume deals with his life and experiences up

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to the time of the patenting of his discovery. The latter half

deals with his experiences in manufacturing, with licenses, and

fights with patent infringers. The latter became so numerous

and flagrant in their violations that in 1851 a suit was filed in

Goodyear's name in the U. S. District Court of New Jersey, re-

ferred to afterwards as the Great India Rubber Case.

With Rufus Choate, famed trial lawyer, as counsel for the

defense, the Goodyear group knew only one man capable of

matching wits with Choate and that was Secretary of State, a

candidate for the Presidential nomination of the Whig Party,

Daniel Webster. That Webster might take the case was almost

unthinkable. And Webster said it was unthinkable until a fee

of $15,000 was offered and then, in spite of his many duties at

Washington and other previously offered excuses he took the

case, for he said, "This fee I must have, for it will pay fifteen

thousand dollars of my debts, and that is what I am striving to

do. . . ." The author comments that "strangely enough there was

no uproar made over this decision of the highest-ranking cabinet

officer to discard temporarily his official garb and assume the

guise of a private citizen long enough to line his pockets" (p. 174).

The account of the trial and Webster's victory almost steal the

show from Goodyear but after some fifty pages we are back to

the India Rubber Man.

Wolf, in a journalistic style, has written what he claims is

the first biography of this man, whom he calls a "queer fanatical

fellow," whose observations that gum mixture (containing sul-

phur) behaved in a totally unexpected fashion on a hot stove,

resulted in a business that will produce the better part of a billion

dollars worth of goods this year, in the United States alone. He

suggests further that we might "multiply this by two, at least,

and add the hundreds of millions invested in the plantations that

produce the raw material; the total value of the fruit of that

single idea advanced with such passionate pertinacity by the India

Rubber Man a hundred years ago" (p. 279). While enthusiasm

on the part of an author for his hero is expected, the reader will

find that earlier in the volume it is revealed that the same dis-

covery was made in England, Sweden and Germany at about the

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BOOK REVIEWS                      89

same time. The reader may judge whether or not the develop-

ment of this great industry might not have come from one of the

other discoveries.

Although the volume is not documented the author reveals

a careful use of the sources indicated in his bibliography and a

thorough familiarity with the subject. The author collaborated

with Howard Wolf in the writing of the only recent comprehen-

sive history of rubber, entitled Rubber: The Story of Glory and

Greed.

W. D. O.

 

 

The Rampaging Frontier. By Thomas D. Clark. (Indianapolis,

Bobbs-Merrill, I939. xvi ?? 350p. $3.)

A conscientious reviewer might wonder if this assignment is

in the nature of work. The apparatus of scholarship is evidenced

by the careful annotations and over 160 items of bibliography,

but the book reads rapidly and smoothly, hurdling over climaxes

of racy stories, entirely unimpeded by this apparatus.

We used to read about the "Wild West." Dr. Clark's pic-

turesque imagination was needed to recreate the "rampaging"

West of 1775-1820, that first American frontier beyond the Alle-

ghenies, now four or five generations removed. In few volumes

are its life and customs presented in entirety. The first observation

that occurs is that this country has decidedly degenerated into a

nation of "panty-waists," whom our "half-horse, half-alligator,"

roaring, gouging, hard-fighting ancestors would never recognize.

Others have noted the value of this book as a source for

students of manners, customs and social life, the psychosis of a

crude civilization. As Professor Schlesinger once remarked, this

period is the medieval times in America.  Clark's descriptions

fit the lawlessness of border medievalism--but we must not push

that analogy. The merit here lies in the presentation of a new

genus. This book is more than a rambling storehouse from which

disagreeing theorists can pull psychic plums. In spite of apparent

aimlessness, it is an organized presentation.  Being stuff with

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general appeal, the chapter headings are disguised with phrasal

"come-ons." Thus we have "Varmints" to describe the animal

environment, "Boom Poles and Paddle Wheels" to convey the

importance of river transportation and life about the waterways.

The fifteen chapters may be roughly divided into four groups,

comprising the general background, communication, types of so-

ciety, and amusements and humor. The final chapter on the

Yankee peddler is unclassifiable. Under the first group, we

read about the physical environment, animal environment, and

the general characteristics of the inhabitants. The second group

deals with rivers and taverns. The third reveals politicians, preach-

ers, the legal profession, and embryonic attempts at rank and

position. The fourth describes the frontier zest for story-telling,

racing, cards, dancing, and music, and the place of women in this

boisterous life.

Yet this is no sociological treatise in disguise. The author

did not think of his subjects and then conceal them under inci-

dents and stories. He let them come to him untreated. In fact

he has so saturated himself with the language that he could prob-

ably qualify as a member of that society were he transported

there in a time machine. He contents himself with a few observa-

tions or rounded descriptions of the subject in each chapter, letting

his pen run from incident to incident, and topping off with the

choicest stories apropos.

Ohio readers can stock up on their collections of tall tales.

The Ohio Valley is the center of a great part of this roistering

life. The frontier described ranges from Ohio, Kentucky, Ten-

nessee, Illinois, and Indiana, to Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas,

and Missouri. The lower central South is left out of the pic-

ture. Kentucky is predominant.

There is a travel quality about the book which is understood

when scanning the bibliography. It is natural that stories about

the people of this day should come from travelers. The well-

known British, French, and American travelers are all used with

discrimination. Dickens is cited once or twice, and one feels his

American Notes vindicated. The description of the voracious in-

habitants feeding (p. 110), which Clark compiles from Fearon,

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BOOK REVIEWS                     91

Hall, and Hoffman is for all the world the counterpart of a

similar scene in Martin Chuzzlewit. How near we are to our

beginnings!

Clark uses not only travelers but many other sources, and

if students wish to enjoy and read, completely unaware of the

painful extractions of scholarship, they should turn to The Ram-

paging Frontier.

CURTIS W. GARRISON.

 

 

Conquest of the Southern Plains; Uncensored Narrative of the

Battle of Washita and Custer's Southern Campaign. By

Charles J. Brill. (Oklahoma City, Golden Saga Publishers,

1938. 323p.)

The hero of the Conquest of the Southern Plains is Black

Kettle, the Cheyenne, or Satanta, the Kiowa, or perhaps Magpie,

another Cheyenne, or any one of a dozen other noble redmen--

all heroes. There is no confusion, however, in finding the villain

--he is George Armstrong Custer, should-be unemployed general

from Ohio. Custer, says the author, "was merciless to man and

beast. He was ruthless in treatment of his foes. An Indian

was an Indian to him; and it is a matter of record that he killed

more Indian women and children than warriors. That he never

was successful in capturing an Indian warrior in battle can be

substantiated. His sole prisoners of war were decrepit old men,

squaws, and papooses. Not once, during his ten years' crusade,

did he ever defeat in battle the red knights who opposed him."

Brill has attempted to show  (1) that the Battle of the

Washita was more critical than it has been considered; (2) that

the Battle of the Little Big Horn has been talked about too much;

(3) that Custer was a "rat"; and (4) that the policy of the

United States Government in the Southern Plains was need-

lessly severe and downright dishonest.

It is popular in the twentieth century to sympathize with the

Indian in his poor treatment by the whites and Brill will have a

hearing; but it is probably due the memory of the "unemployed

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92    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

generals" to remember that such a sympathy was not popular in

the days of Custer and that it would have been very hard to treat

the redman honorably. People seem to demand a scapegoat.

The author has drawn his information from the stories of

Magpie and Little Beaver and Left Hand in addition to the official

reports. He has included thirteen appendices to corroborate his

statements but he would have been much more convincing had

he used a good system of documentation. In a book where so

many popular stories are contradicted the proof should be con-

veniently at hand.

K. W. M.

 

 

The Singin' Gatherin'; Tunes from the Southern Appalachians.

By Jean Thomas and Joseph A. Leeder. (New York, Silver

Burdett Company, 1939. 113p. Illus. $1.50.)

Folk-lore has long been considered important to the scholar

in the field of the social sciences as a reflection of the institutions

of a people, but it has been hard to use because of its ephemeral

nature. There are portions of the earth's surface, however, where

those influences which have complicated beyond all reason the

motives which govern the lives of most of our "civilized" peoples

have not destroyed the force and simplicity of their folk-lore.

One such place is in the Southern Appalachian region. Here, Miss

Jean Thomas has spent much of her life with the people, learning

their ways and interpreting them to the outside world. Her

"Singin' Gatherin'" has been attracting more and more attention

each of the nine years of its existence and has furnished her and

Joseph A. Leeder, of the Music Department of Ohio State Uni-

versity, with the materials for their book, The Singin' Gatherin';

Tunes from the Southern Appalachians.

The songs in the book are divided into ten classifications:

Answering-Back Songs; Play-Game Songs for the Least Uns;

Work Songs; Come Ye and Warning Song-Ballets; Love Ditties;

Hymn Tunes Handed Down; Christmas Singin'; Mountain In-

struments and Their Usage; The Infare; and The Singin'

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BOOK REVIEWS                      93

Gatherin'. The book has many fine photographic illustrations,

contains brief histories of the songs and directions for their play-

ing. It is designed for use in schools and recreation groups as

well as by students of history, sociology and music.

Miss Thomas' annual Singin' Gatherin', by introducing the

folk-songs of Kentucky to the world of "hill-billy" crazes and

"jazz-band" interpretations may hasten the death of the folk-

song. On the other hand, the Gatherin' may continue to be a

vital part of the life of the mountaineer for many years. But

whether it does or not, it will be remembered better now that it

is in printed form.

K. W. M.

 

 

Dances of Our Pioneers. Collected by Grace L. Ryan; music

arrangements by Robert T. Benford; illustrations by Brooks

Emerson. (New York, A. S. Barnes & Co., c1939. 19⁶⁹.

Illus., music. $2.00.)

This volume makes a fitting companion to the Singin' Gath-

erin', by Thomas and Leeder, reviewed elsewhere in this issue.

More and more, recreation leaders are turning to the games,

songs and dances of our earlier history as sources of entertain-

ment which more adequately meet their problems of providing

clean fun for adolescent youth and inexpensive recreation for

adults who need to forget for an evening the hardships produced

by economic inequality. For community recreation where all ages

and sexes must be considered folk dances are unequaled in pro-

viding enjoyment. This point is well recognized by Lynn Rohr-

bough of Delaware, Ohio, who has turned an old barn into a

place where, at regular intervals, recreation leaders may come

to participate in singing the old songs, enter into the spirit of the

old time play-party, and dance the country dances, the better to

acquaint themselves with them.

This handy book is excellent in every way because, besides

describing clearly the formations and changes of quadrilles

(square dances), contra, circle and couple dances, it provides the

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94    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

"calls" and music, as well as illustrates pictorially many of the

terms used. These illustrations are especially well done. There

is an index, a glossary, and an analytic table of contents.

Miss Ryan, who is in the Department of Physical Education

at Central State Teachers College, Mt. Pleasant, Michigan, is

to be praised for her excellent contribution to the preservation

of this part of our folk culture, and the publishers are to be

congratulated for producing so beautiful a volume at so attractive

a price.

C. L. W.

 

 

Old Forts and Real Folks. By Susan Burdick Davis. (Madison,

Wisconsin, Zoe Bayliss and Susan Davis, 1939. 332p. $2.00.)

Old Forts and Real Folks is an adaptation of personal nar-

ratives from Wisconsin history for reading by children. The

author is Dean of Freshman Women in the University of Wis-

consin, and has had considerable experience in story-telling for

children, having been Instructor in Children's Literature and the

Art of Story-Telling at the University of Wisconsin, and having

already published a book entitled Wisconsin Lore for Boys and

Girls.

Miss Davis feels that from the stories of Wisconsin's past

children will draw inspiration to live a better life. As an at-

tempt to make local history a practical working force the book

is interesting. For example, the author draws from the story

of a medical experiment by Dr. William Beaumont, pioneer

physiologist, such sage advice as "don't neglect your raw cabbage,

carrots, and lettuce," and "treat your stomach like a friend and

helper; in this treatment lies much of your health." This is

probably the most pointed example of practical history in the

book but many of the stories have been selected for their moral

lessons.

K. W. M.

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BOOK REVIEWS                       95

It Takes All Kinds. By Louis Bromfield. (New York, Harper

& Brothers, 1939. ⁶90p.)

While it is neither set in his native state nor rich in ar-

chaeological or historical significance, this book, the latest work

of the Ohio-born Louis Bromfield, is worthy of mention as a deft

analysis of contemporary and near-contemporary types, selected

from both the national and the international scene. A full-bodied

volume, It Takes All Kinds is made up of three full-length

novels, two novelettes, and four short stories. The assured fa-

cility of the master craftsman is apparent throughout, as is also

a mood and manner faintly reminiscent of the writing of Somer-

set Maugham--which means that Louis Bromfield's latest work

is a stimulating and entertaining, albeit somewhat superficial,

volume.

L. R. H.

 

 

 

American Potters and Pottery. By John Ramsay. (Boston, Hale,

Cushman and Flint, 1939. 304p. Illus. $3.75.)

Mr. John Ramsay, a resident of Canton, Ohio, is known to

many in this state as a collector and specialist in early American

pottery. This volume is not intended to be a history of American

pottery although the introductory chapters afford an historical

treatment of the subject. Neither is the volume a study of the

manufacture of pottery, although there is an excellent discussion

of the various types of American pottery and certain technical

aspects of the subject pertaining particularly to glazes and other

data of value to the collector. But the historical and technical

data, as comprehensive as it is, has been compressed into a small

space, for the book is essentially a check-list of some 1200 Amer-

ican potters. Ramsay has selected the more important, giving

their names, location, date, names of their successors, or any

changes of ownership, and the date of final closing. To these

facts are added data on the types of ware made, marks used,

or other distinguishing characteristics, with occasional reference

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96    OHIO ARCHEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

to the text or to illustrations. It has not been possible for the

author to give all these facts about all the potters included in the

list and it appears that the closing date is the most difficult to

pin down.

There are nearly 100 illustrations and over 100 potters' marks

which make this book indispenable to the serious collector. The

work is geographically spotty, Ramsay thinks, since he has been

able to work only in territory which has already been studied

and reported, omitting some states where really important ma-

terial remains to be studied. But it is our opinion that since it

covers the really important ceramic producing states, including

among others, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Ohio, that the

author's criticism of his own work should not detract from any

estimation of its value as it stands.

W. D. O.

 

 

Wild Flowers of Ohio. By Harold L. Madison. Pocket Natural

History, No.7. Botanical Series, No.1. (Cleveland, O.,

Cleveland Museum of Natural History, 1938. 190p. Illus.

$1.50.)

This admirable little booklet will fill a long-felt need for a

field-book on Ohio wild flowers. There are a number of excellent

field-books on wild flowers, but they, unfortunately, are all written

and published on the Atlantic coast and invariably contain a large

number of plants not found in the Middle West, and, conversely,

omit some of our most familiar species.

The book is of a size which will fit easily into the coat

pocket or hand-bag. It is well printed and substantially bound

in water-resistant fabricoid. No less than 825 species of plants

are briefly described and figured with attractive line drawings

by Miss Ruth C. Mayer. Thus, the great majority of our Ohio

wild flowers and not a few of our flowering shrubs are included.

If one were disposed to be critical, criticism might be made

of the selection of plants to be treated. It will be noted that a

number of very rare plants have been included (several of which

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BOOK REVIEWS                      97

have never been found in Ohio) while some of our most abun-

dant species have been omitted. No two persons, however, would

probably agree on this subject, since it must remain largely a

matter of personal opinion, and the criticism is slight as com-

pared with the general worth of the publication. The Cleveland

Museum of Natural History and all concerned in the production

of the book are to be congratulated on this real service to the

nature lovers of Ohio.

EDWARD S. THOMAS.

 

 

Rifles Beyond Fort Pitt. By Elizabeth Hawthorn Buck. (Phila-

delphia, Penn Publishing Company, 1939. 240p. Illus. $1.50.)

This book, which the publishers recommend for boys and girls

from ten to fifteen, deals with a chapter in American history which

ought to appeal to older readers. It is a story of a young scout in

1779, fighting with the frontiersmen against the Indians and

Tories on the Pennsylvania border and in the Ohio country. The

story is told in fourteen chapters, with three illustrations.

The latter part of the book is of distinct interest to readers

of Ohio history since the author traces the frontiersmen across

Ohio, through Schoenbrunn, Gnadenhutten, on to Upper San-

dusky and Sandusky. According to the story, the hero even

penetrates the stronghold of British power at Detroit. On the

return trip to Pennsylvania the incidents of Brady's famous leap

and Brady Lake are portrayed. The story of his visit with the

Moravian Christian Indians in the Tuscarawas Valley is given

in a chapter entitled Gnadenhutten. While mention is made of

the slaughter of the Christian Indians there in 1781, yet the story

is really that of Schoenbrunn.

Mrs. Buck has previously given us another story of the

western frontier entitled Moccasins in the Wilderness.

H. L.

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The Changing West: An Economic Theory About Our Golden

Age. By William Allen White. (New York, Macmillan Com-

pany, 1939. 144p. $1.50.)

Mr. White uses the term "West" to mean the territory "West

of Buffalo and Pittsburgh, north of the Ohio River, onward to the

Pacific coast from Los Angeles to Seattle." This section contains

twenty-four states.

Considered culturally, this territory gave rise to the growth

of human liberty under economic conditions which marked its

path to a sectional civilization. The Protestant church and the

"little red schoolhouse," the "two basic free institutions" upon

which the West was built, caused the development of a unique

civilization or, as the author says, "a new thing for mankind."

The forces generated by these basic institutions were "the prac-

tical acceptance of the Christian philosophy," and the tenets of

credit and democracy. These tenets, Mr. White believes, are pro-

foundly middle-class.

In writing this very interesting and readable essay--it is

hardly more than an essay, 144 short pages--the author has added

to his own youthful optimism some of the theories of Frederick

Jackson Turner and of Thorstein Veblen. He has pictured the

three waves of migration into the West, the waves that Turner

spoke of as, first, the squatter pioneer; second, the farmer who

purchased his land, taking advantage of the pre-emption law; and

third, the man of capital and enterprise. These succeeding waves

of humanity brought a steady and dependable rise in the price of

land. This "princely increment of land values," transmitted and

distributed by the democratic process into fluid capital, formed the

source for the prosperity of the western farmer. However, by

the turn of the century the frontier had disappeared and with it

went the unearned increment in land values. "The sun had set

upon the Golden Age," and the farm problem had arisen to plague

the politicians.

Perhaps the chief reason the farm problem has not been

solved is due to our failure to understand that there are many farm

problems. The wheat grower of the plains, the "barnyard cattle-

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man," and the owner of the irrigated farms in the Arkansas River

Valley have different problems which demand different solutions.

But to Mr. White one thing is certain: To save the farmers from

becoming a degraded peasantry, "we must even subsidize in vari-

ous ways the business of farming." The major solution of the

farm problems, however, will be found, perhaps, in the solution

of our industrial problems, for the "western farmer must rise or

fall upon the purchasing power of the industrial worker." And to

insure equality and justice for the industrial worker, the author

believes that collective bargaining power for labor must be firmly

established. Man cannot bargain alone with the buyer of labor

who represents a great corporate industry.

Thus Mr. White has given us an essay on social salvation. He

might have titled it, "Have faith in democracy--and work to de-

stroy the economic inequalities that have arisen in our society."

But this reviewer cannot believe that the author's solution will

come out of the West, for the western farmer usually has been

opposed to the labor movement.

EUGENE O. PORTER.

 

 

The Westward Movement. By Ina Faye Woestemeyer with the

editorial collaboration of J. Montgomery Gambrill. (New

York, D. Appleton-Century Co., I939. 500p. Illus. $3.00.)

There are about 125 selections in this volume, arranged to tell

the story of the Westward Movement, taken from biographies,

guides, legal documents, books on exploration and travel, and such

widely differing sources as personal letters and fiction.

The material has been grouped into three main sections: first

"The Lure of the West," second "The Spread of People from

Coast to Coast," and third "Progress of the Frontiers of Culture."

Miss Woestemeyer first assembled these readings as a "Profes-

sional Project" in her work for the Ed.D. degree at Teachers

College, Columbia University, with special reference to the needs

and interests of high school pupils.

Selections have been made from such sources as the Journal

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100   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

of Conrad Weiser, Colonial Records of Georgia, Niles' Register,

Flint's Recollections of the Last Ten Years, Bryce's American

Commonwealth, Roosevelt's Ranch Life in the West, Mark

Twain's Roughing It, and Life on the Mississippi, and Ogg's The

Old Northwest.

The readings are not extensive enough to serve the purpose

of the mature student nor was sufficient care exercised in re-

producing the selections accurately, but the book brings together

readable and interesting passages into a general narrative treatment

and should encourage the high school student to delve further into

the original works cited.

W. D. O.

 

 

The Delectable Country. By Leland D. Baldwin. (New York,

Lee Furman, Inc., 1939. 715p. $2.75.)

Every circumstance of life in the Ohio and Mississippi valleys

during the last decade of the eighteenth century was exciting.

That decade was packed with story-making conditions and epi-

sodes. Nothing was certain--not even death and taxes. Few

realized what government they were living under and fewer knew

or cared much what government they would have tomorrow. The

realities of life were plain enough and cruel enough but they were

not sobering. The people were wild and therefore did interesting

things. It is hard to see how a story about them could be anything

but thrilling, and Mr. Leland D. Baldwin has made of The

Delectable Country a good story of these times and people.

David Braddee knew his way around the river and was quite

an all-around hero. He could out-fight and out-brag even Mike

Fink. He could kill Indians with the best. He could land a keel-

boat below the cut at Pittsburgh like a veteran. He could out-

debate the blue-bloods of the city. He could love tenderly a good

woman and he could make a fallen woman take new interest in

life. He could make Christians of villains. He could talk Latin

with a Spaniard. He could even gouge the eyes from a starved

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BOOK REVIEWS                     101

 

bear. In short, he was a real man and a real hero as anyone can

see.

David's many-sided character was developed by Mr. Baldwin

to bring into the picture as great a portion of the life of the period

as possible. Although David himself may seem a little unreal at

times he was associated with real people and he did real things.

He was at the center of things during the Whiskey Insurrection

of 1794. He saw all sides of life in Pittsburgh and New Orleans

and was well acquainted with all the towns and settlements in

between. Into his life came real men like Hugh Brackinridge,

David Bradford, Daniel Strong, General Daniel Morgan, the

Nevilles, Alexander Hamilton, Don Manuel Gayoso de Lemos, and

many others.

The first half of the book is chiefly devoted to the story of

the Whiskey Insurrection. Mr. Baldwin is a historian and one

of his fields of research has been the Whiskey Insurrection in

western Pennsylvania. He has published a scholarly history of

the subject and he knows what he is writing about. Toward the

end of the Whiskey Insurrection portion the reader is likely to

begin expecting to see notes at the bottom of the pages, but this

does not last long. The story drifts out of the fact-recital stage

and resumes the smooth reading tempo of the first few chapters.

The last half of the book deals with life on the Ohio and

Mississippi rivers. David Braddee is lured away from the search

for "the delectable country" in the realm of literature and learning

to the paradise of adventure only to find that the search is not

ended--that the quest must be continued in the "way of the Lord."

This reviewer's desire that David would come to his senses and

take Hugh Brackinridge's advice was left unrequited by the hero's

early death. One is left with the same sort of feeling that he

would expect from finishing the story of an eighteenth century

Studs Lonigan. At any rate if you want history you can trust,

in a form you can read, get a copy of Leland D. Baldwin's The

Delectable Country.

K. W. M.

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102   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

Blazing the Way West. By Bliss Isely. (New York, Charles

Scribner's Sons, 1939. 286p. $3.00.)

This is a history of the French explorers and trappers who

found the lakes, rivers, and portages in the wilderness that was

their North American empire. Mr. Isely begins with Cartier and

Roberval and then narrates the activities of Champlain, Nicolet,

Radisson and Grosseillers (the author calls him Chouart), Talon,

Frontenac, Cadillac, Jolliet and Marquette, and LaSalle. But the

book is not limited to a consideration of the early French ex-

plorers; it deals too with the French traders who operated be-

tween the lower Mississippi Valley and the Spanish settlements

in what is now Texas; it treats also of the Chouteaus and other

enterprising merchants who traded out of St. Louis after the

Louisiana Purchase. The story is brought to a close with a hasty

narration of the Whitman expedition to the Oregon country, and

of Juneau's removal to Alaska.

Mr. Isely has not written here a history of colonial wars, for

his attention is always on the men of the West and their activities

as explorers, trappers, and traders. Another principal concern of

his is to point out the many names of towns, rivers, and lakes in

our West which are French in origin. He gives an interesting ex-

planation for the name of the Republican River, a tributary of the

Missouri.

At times the style seems developed to astonish the reader at

the hardships suffered by the early explorers, for instance, the

contrast drawn between the discomfort of George Washington's

first crossing of the Alleghenies with the comfort in which one

may cross them today. There is in this book some of the apparatus

of scholarship, but few or no new interpretations and conclusions.

The characters remain the same if not less sprightly and less well

developed than in Professor Wrong's Conquest of New France.

This obviously is not a book for a professional historian; but

for one who knows little or nothing about the French pioneers in

the West, it will present a workable, fundamental picture. There

are numerous illustrations, nine maps, a guide to pronunciation, a

bibliography, and an index.

JOHN H. McMINN.

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BOOK REVIEWS                     103

We Who Built America. By Carl Wittke. (New York, Prentice-

Hall, Inc., 1939. xviii ?? 547p. $5.00.)

The title of this work sounds like a crusade, but is justified

from every stand. Favorable reviews in the press testify to its

wide appeal and substantial importance. The casual footnoting

and absence of bibliographical "front" will doubtless obscure from

the press's lay readers the mountainous work backing the thousands

of interesting facts presented. The variety of citations to books,

monographs, propaganda pamphlets, and popular works is amazing.

In addition to the usual literature on our immigrants, Dr. Wittke

has gleaned from the most unsuspected quarters. Publication of

this bibliography would be useful. Added to that are hundreds

of references to the American and foreign-language press.

This adds up to a book of deceiving simplicity. Those who

rush between its covers to feed a crusading zeal will stay to par-

take of a feast. The reviewer must come out a gourmand. The

work seems like an encyclopedia, but the facts are carefully se-

lected, each chapter is well proportioned according to its im-

portance, each section well balanced, and the book as a whole has

a totality of effect. This is due to the plan.

In the "Introduction," Dr. Wittke compares the enactment of

drastic restrictive legislation against immigrants following the close

of the World War, in its effect, to the passing of the frontier in

American history. That is the major reason for a work of this

kind. "Since 191O, there has been almost no gain in the foreign-

born population (white) of the United States." (p. xvii) On the

last page he writes, "The Story of American immigration has been

told." He regards his work as a review or tentative summary,

stimulating others perhaps to complete more definitive studies as

the spadework for a more complete study. While he attempts in

this book to review immigration in its broadest political, economic,

and cultural implications, he has confined himself to a historical

rather than a sociological treatment.

Dr. Wittke assumes, of course, that our American civilization

is basically Anglo-Saxon and our population is, by a vast majority,

English. The best statistics indicate that since 1790 something

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104   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

like 36,000,000 aliens arrived in the United States. He then studies

this phenomenon under three headings: "The Colonial Period"

(97 PP.), "The Old Immigration" (300 pp.), and "The New Im-

migration and Nativism" (113 pp.). The Negro is omitted because

of an "adequate and steadily expanding literature" available. The

first period is essentially a cultural study of the colonial Dutch,

French, Irish and Scotch-Irish, Germans, and a few minor groups.

These chapters are probably the best summaries now available.

The immigrant colonial contribution was not important politically

but led to spreading democracy, and religious toleration.

"The Old Immigration" treats mainly of the Irish, the Ger-

mans, and the Scandinavians, with a chapter on the Swiss, Dutch,

Russian-Germans, Welsh, French, and Jews. The old immigra-

tion contributed the greatest flood, rising in the 1840's, and reach-

ing a maximum in 1890. However, "The New Immigration" from

southern and eastern Europe, the Czechs and Slovaks, Poles, Ju-

goslavs, Russians, Hungarians, Italians, Greeks, Armenians, Por-

tuguese and Spanish, reached their peak by the decade, 19O1-191O.

Dr. Wittke rather summarizes the new immigration without at-

tempting final conclusions. On this account these chapters have

less appeal, and the treatise as a whole, rather ends on a question

mark, in spite of the ending of an era. In this the author is true to

history. Vertical reading is possible in this work. An essay or

book on immigration could be made up of the "Introduction," the

two chapters entitled "The Immigrant Traffic," which describes the

transportation and arrival of colonial and old immigrations, the

first part of Chapter 14 on the new immigration, and the last chap-

ter on "Closing the Gates." Or one could take the two chapters

on the Germans. Except for the discussion on music, the chapter,

"Culture in Immigrant Chests" is just a little disappointing, but

consistent in historical description rather than an interpretation.

As Dr. Wittke remarks, it sometimes resolves into a catalogue.

This is a good book for every library. It answers questions.

If we know where Santa Claus originated, do we know about bowl-

ing? Who were the Mathewites? What is the origin of the Kin-

dergarten? Why did the Irish stay in the cities? Yet all these

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BOOK REVIEWS                     105

 

facts are built up in their proper chapters into a compact architec-

tural unity, leaving a rounded impression.

The book is an inspiration to historical and sociological

students. It penetrates American history in every era. Dr. Wittke

shows admirable restraint. It might have resolved into another

interpretation of our historical development. He describes the

activities and influence of each group, and passes on. The rela-

tion of the Frei Gemeinde in the 1840's to the Unitarian and tran-

scendental movements would be a fine subject for study. The

description of the German cooperatives (p. 238) is suggestive. The

role of religion in America was tremendously influenced by the

immigrant. They escaped to the America of religious freedom

often to get away from a growing liberalism. Is that one reason

why we are the bulwark of conservatism? The study of immi-

grants as a means toward the understanding of international his-

tory is an old approach. This movement is often the natural tie

between our history and the Old World. The importance for local

history is obvious, and, of course local history studies of these

groups account for many of the author's sources. How much

light it throws on many of our friends and acquaintances! None

of us are without friends bearing foreign strains. Often they

account for important trends in the business and industrial history

of our community. A notable production might also be made of

selections from immigrant narratives, or "American letters."

Ohioans will find new and absorbing details, such as the de-

scription of German life in Cincinnati (p. 212), frequent mention

of Friederich Hassaurek, the equality of German and English

languages in Cincinnati schools of the 1840's, and the unconstitu-

tionality of the Anti-German Language Law (p. 234). There is

an interesting description of the communistic experiment of Zoar

in the chapter on "Immigrant Utopias." Right here should be

mentioned the inadequacy of the index from the subject standpoint,

which is greatly to be deplored. The statement about the Jo-

sephinum at Columbus will be news to many (p. 228).

The reviewer is tempted to call this study a footnote to Mal-

thus. The opposition of labor to unrestricted immigration since

• 22
 

1O6   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

the appearance of the United American Mechanics (p. 485) is sig-

nificant. No doubt many interpretations will be inspired. But

this is a story of the masses filling up the land, breaking up old

settlements, rebuilding, and founding greater ones, as our civiliza-

tion was hammered out on the anvil of "Americanization" (p.

xviii). It is the story of "We Who Built America," and we hope

the past tense has no unintentional significance.

CURTIS W. GARRISON.

 

 

The Wars of the Iroquois: A Study in Intertribal Trade Rela-

tions. By George T. Hunt. (Madison, University of Wiscon-

sin Press, 1940. 209p. $3.00.)

Professor Hunt has made no effort to write a history of the

Iroquois. He has merely tried to answer a question he has raised:

"Why did the Iroquois do the things they did?"

In arriving at an answer to this question Professor Hunt at-

tempts to disprove three theories that have been advanced by other

writers. One theory, advanced by Francis Parkman, is that the

Iroquois were inherently possessed of an "insensate fury" and a

"homicidal frenzy." A second theory, advanced by Lewis H. Mor-

gan who used Cadwallader Colden "liberally as a background," is

that the Iroquois derived their strength from their superior politi-

cal organization. "The League of the Iroquois, produced by a

superior Iroquois intellect, rendered the five Nations invincible."

And their motive for exterminating their enemies was the desire

to establish universal intertribal peace. The third theory, advanced

by Frederick Jackson Turner and others of his school, is that the

Iroquois were able to give expression to their "natural passion for

conquest and butchery" because they were well armed by a greedy

Dutch West India Company.

Professor Hunt shows, however, that the League of the Iro-

quois was no more effective than the loose Powhatanic or Cherokee

leagues, the Algonquin confederacy, or the Choctaw republic. In

fact, there never existed political unity among the Five Nations.

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BOOK REVIEWS                     107

 

No ambassador ever was able to speak for all the tribes. The

Onondagas made treaties of peace with enemies of the Mohawks

and the Mohawks refused to aid the Senecas and Cayugas against

the Susquehannahs. Indeed, it was very seldom that the five tribes

joined with each other to fight a common enemy.

In answer to the Turner theory, Professor Hunt shows that

it was contrary to the policy of the Dutch West India Company

to sell guns to any Indians. As a matter of fact, ten years after

Fort Nassau was established the Iroquois "not only had no fire-

arms but even feared them excessively." On the other hand, the

French policy was to sell firearms to all converted Indians. In

fact, the French used trade in arms and other goods as the hand-

maid of religion. And William Bradford in his Plimouth Planta-

tion blamed especially the French for supplying the Indians with

arms.

Nor were the Iroquois merely possessed of an insensate fury.

Nicholas Perrot, one of the greatest of the French woods-rovers,

wrote that "although ambition and vengeance are two passions

which imperiously possess the minds of the savages, self-interest

carries them still further, and has more ascendancy over them."

Also, as Professor Hunt points out, "trader fought trader and

hunter fought hunter, but trader and hunter never fought each

other."

The author believes, therefore, that the wars of the Iroquois

were the results of their efforts to control the fur trade. By 1640

New York state had been depleted of fur-bearing animals and the

Iroquois were compelled to fight for control of the northern and

western fur trade or perish.

This reviewer believes that Professor Hunt, in his judicious

use of source material and in his logical interpretation of acces-

sible facts, has arrived at a conclusion that justifies his thesis. He

has made a real contribution to the history of the American In-

dians. The book is well documented, contains three appendices, an

extensive bibliography, a brief critical analysis of the chief sources,

and an adequate index. The author writes with ease and, although

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1O8   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

the nature of his study demands a didactic rather than a narrative

style, he has produced an unusually readable book.

 

EUGENE O. PORTER.

 

 

Squawtown: My Boyhood among the Last Miami Indians. By

R. H. Hall. (Caldwell, Idaho, Caxton Printers, Ltd., 1939.

209p. $2.50.)

This is the story of a small boy who went with his parents to

live on an Indian reservation in Indiana.

Before the "Great Trek" of 1841, when there was agitation

to segregate the Indians west of the Mississippi River, Chief

Francis Godfrey of the Miamis used his influence with government

officials to effect a compromise. The Godfreys, their relatives, and

their close friends which included a few Potawatomis, about three

hundred in all, were allowed to remain in Indiana. They were

given a reservation, later called "Squawtown," of three thousand

acres located about three miles south of Peru in the fork of the

Wabash and Mississinewa rivers. The Indians were also allotted

an annual pension of fifty dollars each for two generations. When

Chief Godfrey died in 1859 he was succeeded by his son Gabriel

who proved himself a careful guardian of his people. He encour-

aged white men to come to the reservation to teach the Indians

farming. To pay the white men for their trouble Chief Gabriel

granted them a generous tract of land free of rent.

The Hall family moved to the reservation in 1875 and re-

mained there for several years. This book is an effort to recap-

ture the impressions those years made upon young Hall. His story

is of experiences that any boy might have in school, on the play-

ground, and in the fields. Perhaps the adult reader would have

preferred a more serious study of the customs, superstitions, and

every-day life of the Indians; but to have written of these things

the author would have lost the boy's point of view. Mr. Hall does

make some interesting comments however. He writes that "there

is very little difference fundamentally between them and the

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BOOK REVIEWS                      109

 

whites." They are "less talkative and are socially timid in a mixed

or white environment, but . . . their inferiority complex is

probably no greater than that in the lower stratum of white society

when the whites of that class are thrown with their social su-

periors."

The experiment to train the Indians to be self-sufficient was

a failure. The author believes that the annual pension destroyed

their initiative and morale. They were not interested in farming

and could not learn to bind wheat or oats so that the sheaf would

hold. They were "either lazy or too inherently proud to do man-

ual labor."

This book is well written and has an unusual charm that ap-

peals both to adults and children. Its value lies in the fact that it

has saved for posterity a picture of the little Miami reservation

which has disappeared because of white aggressiveness and the

death of the Indians.

EUGENE O. PORTER.

• 26