CONWAY,
Ark. (October 23, 2013) – Fought in Earnest:
Civil War Arkansas, a free traveling exhibit chronicling major historical events
in Arkansas between 1861 and 1865, will be displayed on the first floor of Bailey
Library at Hendrix College on Monday, Nov. 4 – Tuesday, Nov. 26 during the
hours the library is open:
Monday-Thursday 8 a.m. –midnight, Friday 8 a.m. – 5 p.m., Saturday noon
– 5 p.m., and Sunday 2 p.m. –midnight.
Fought
in earnest contains fifteen free-standing banners that showcase images from the
Arkansas History Commission’s holdings. Original documents, photographs, maps,
drawings, paintings and artifacts illustrate the story of the Civil War in
Arkansas. These primary source materials offer a first-hand look at the lives
of Confederate and Union soldiers, government officials and civilians from 1861
to 1865.
“We
wanted to develop several types of materials to commemorate the
sesquicentennial of the Civil War in Arkansas,” stated Dr. Lisa Speer, State
Historian and the History Commission’s Director. She continued, “I am very
pleased that Hendrix College is sharing this intimate glimpse into Arkansas’s
role in the Civil War with their visitors and community.”
Other
Civil War materials developed by the Commission for the sesquicentennial
include two books, Traveled through a
fine country: The Journal of Captain Henry Brockman and Documenting Arkansas: The Civil War 1861-1865,
the companion book to Fought in earnest. Online order forms for these
publications are available here.
During
its 107-year existence the State Archives has actively collected materials from
this crucial era in our nation and our state. Diaries written by soldiers and
citizens; letters to mothers,
fathers,
wives, sweethearts, brothers, and sisters; military orders, newspaper accounts,
photographs, broadsides, and even party invitations recount the day-to-day
lives of people caught up in the most significant event in nineteenth century
America. These publications and exhibit use these primary source materials to
tell the story of the Civil War from an Arkansas perspective. The variety of
items represents the breadth of the Commission’s Civil War resources, while
thousands more documents are available to researchers.
For
more information about the exhibit at Hendrix College, contact Library Director
Britt Anne Murphy at 501-450-1288 or murphyb@hendrix.edu. To schedule the
exhibit in your institution call the Arkansas History Commission at
501.682.6900 or e-mail state.archives@arkansas.gov.
This
exhibit was produced in part by a grant from the Arkansas Natural and Cultural
Resources Council, funded by the Arkansas Real Estate Transfer Tax.
Founded
in 1876, Hendrix College is a national leader in engaged liberal arts and
sciences education. For the sixth consecutive year, Hendrix was named one of
the country’s “Up and Coming” liberal arts colleges by U.S. News and World Report.
Hendrix is featured in the latest edition of Colleges
That Change Lives: 40 Schools That Will Change the Way You Think about Colleges, as well as the
2014 Princeton Review’s The Best 378
Colleges, Forbes
magazine's list of America's Top Colleges, and the 2014 Fiske Guide to Colleges. Hendrix
has been affiliated with the United Methodist Church since 1884. For more
information, visit www.hendrix.edu.