The rollicking tales of Old Southwestern humor were a distinctive contribution to American folk culture provided by the frontiersmen of the South and Southwest, a tradition brought to its highest form in the work of Mark Twain. Among the precursors of Twain was John Gorman Barr of Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Like Twain, Barr grew up in a river town, worked in a printing office, and traveled widely; and again like Twain, Barr drew upon the people and places of his home region as the primary sources for his tales.
In addition to the pure entertainment Barr’s stories provide, they also furnish a comprehensive picture of Tuscaloosa and western Alabama in the 1850s—the roaring river town coexisting uneasily with the intellectual sophistication of the recently established University of Alabama.
List of IllustrationsPrefaceIntroductionSalted Him, or An Auctioneer Doing All the BiddingOld Charley and the President's VetoOld Charley and His Impromptu RideA Hand-Around Supper in AlabamaA Steamboat Captain's Love AdventureHow Tom Croghan Carved the TurkeySpiritualism ExplainedPiscatory Reflections and ReminiscencesNew York Drummer's Ride to Greensboro'Jemmy Owen's Fifty Dollar Note; or, “Moind Whay Ye Say”John Bealle's Accident—or, How the Widow Dudu Treated InsanityRelief for Ireland! or, John Brown's Bad Luck With His Pickled BeefA Lively Village; or, Brisk Speculation in a New CommodityMisplaced Confidence; or, Bilking a Boniface!Appendix“More Silence!”HooperJohnson Jones“Jemmy Owen on the Senatorial Election”HooperJohnson JonesNotes
G. Ward Hubbs, professor emeritus at Birmingham-Southern College, is grateful to call Tuscaloosa home. He is the editor of Rowdy Tales from Early Alabama: The Humor of John Gorman Barr and author of Guarding Greensboro: A Confederate Company in the Making of a Southern Community and Searching for Freedom after the Civil War: Klansman, Carpetbagger, Scalawag, and Freedman.