Dewey W. Grantham (1921–2004)

2733 The South in Modern America: A Region at Odds, by Dewey W. Grantham (read 20 Apr 1995) This is a 1994 book by a Vanderbilt professor. It is a carefully constructed book which tells of the South from 1875 to 1994, and does so very even-handedly. It is a little heavy on sociology and really did not tell me too much I didn't know. But the story told is intriguing--at least de jure the South is no longer the abomination it was when I was young and was repelled by the repression which was its most prominent feature. This is the fourth book in The New American Nation series I have read and all the volumes I have read have been good ones. The book also has a good chapter on southern literature… (más)

2742 Hoke Smith and the Politics of the New South, by Dewey W. Grantham, Jr. (read 8 May 1995) This is not as good a book as C. Vann Woodward's 1938 book on Tom Watson, but it tells a straightforward account of its subject (born at Newton, N. C. on Sep 2, 1855, a lawyer before he was 18, Secretary of the Interior for most of Cleveland's second term, elected Governor of Georgia in 1906, and U.S. Senator--after again being elected Governor in 1910--from Nov 16, 1911, to March 3, 1921, having been defeated by the obnoxious Tom Watson in 1920). Smith's race position was obnoxious, and he worked for Negro disenfranchisement. He was an early spokesman for the Wilson Administration, but that did not last, and during the war he was anti-Wilson and was a leading Southern reservationist in the League fight. This book is well worth reading. It won the 1960 Snyder award as the best book published re Southern history during the preceding two years.… (más)