A Life on the Black River in Arkansas

by Coleman, E. R.

• ISBN13: 9781935106043
• ISBN10: 193510604X
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-09-01
• Publisher: Butler Center for Arkansas Studies

Summary

"The Black River flows from Missouri into Arkansas east of Branson and west of the Bootheel. It meanders where the foothills of the Ozarks begin to rise out of the Mississippi plain. The area was sparsely populated when E. R. Coleman was a young man. Roads, farms, and businesses were modest and scattered. Arkansas was still "the bear state." Coleman's early years were shaped by the Great Depression, by a family ethic that dictated working as long as the sun shone, and by a region bordered on the west by Oklahoma's "dust bowl" and on the east by the mighty - sometimes vengeful - Mississippi River. He grew up to become the sort of man who could drive the bulldozer and clear the land for a bank he owned. His words suggest a real American Horatio Alger epic of hardscrabble beginnings, work days longer and harder than today's youth might be able to imagine, and plain dealing from soybean fields to board rooms."--BOOK JACKET.

Author Biography

Ewell R. Coleman has left an indelible mark on the Delta country of North Arkansas, and has done nearly every kind of work imaginable in a developing rural region. After launching and sustaining a variety of small businesses, he focused on banking in Batesville and neighboring communities.

Table of Contents

You Have to Have a Toehold	p. 13
My Second Toehold	p. 34
My Third Toehold	p. 49
On the Way up the Mountain	p. 54
The Top of the Mountain	p. 64
A Long Way from Dowdy	p. 73
Stories from the Black River	p. 80
More Tales from the River	p. 89
Memories of Independence County, Arkansas	p. 96
Looking Back. Looking Forward	p. 104
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