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Claudia Bushman's Latest Book Published by Johns Hopkins U Press
BALTIMORE, MARYLAND -- Johns Hopkins University Press announces the
publication of: In Old Virginia: Slavery, Farming, and Society in the
Journal of John Walker by Claudia L. Bushman. A Columbia University
professor, Bushman is the author and editor of seven books, including
Mormon Sisters: Women in Early Utah; America Discovers Columbus: How
an Italian Explorer Became an American Hero; and "A Good Poor Man's
Wife," Being a Chronicle of Harriet Hanson Robinson and Her Family in
Nineteenth-Century New England.
"Drawing on the extraordinary collection of Walker's manuscript farm
journals, this book imparts a strong sense of what life was like for
this farmer and his family. Topics include husbandry, weather, local
politics, work, domestic economy, religion and community, relations
with neighbors and slaves, health and medical practices, and the
property and land-use history of individual farms. Bushman's
scholarship is sound and her writing is clear. Rich in charming
detail, In Old Virginia will be a valuable resource for social
historians of slavery and rural society." says David F. Allmendinger,
Jr. of the University of Delaware.
In 1824, John Walker purchased a 500-acre farm in King and Queen
County, Virginia, and began working it with a dozen slaves. The son
of a local politician and planter who grew tobacco, Walker lost
status when he became a devout Methodist, raised wheat, and treated
his slaves like brothers and sisters. He also kept a detailed and
fascinating journal.
Drawing on this forty-three-year chronicle, Claudia L. Bushman
provides a richly illuminating study, a microhistory that is
rewarding to read. Walker sets aside most of the "Old South planter"
stereotype. He sold wheat in Baltimore and Norfolk and invested in
railroad stock, and yet he grew, spun, and wove cotton for clothing,
tanned leather, and made shoes. He avoided lavish creature comforts
in favor of purchasing the latest farm equipment. So far from losing
out to soil exhaustion, he experimented with improved farming
methods, nourished his land, and kept his yields high.
Walker's journal describes the legal cases he tenaciously pursued,
records devotion to the local Methodist church, and explains his
practice of Thomsonian medicine on slaves and family members alike.
He provides insight into women's work and lays out the drama of
blacks and whites living in close intimacy and constant fear. Walker
humbly referred to himself as "a poor illiterate worm," but his diary
dramatically captures the life of a small planter in antebellum
Virginia.
Source:
Johns Hopkins University Press announces: In Old Virginia
Johns Hopkins University Press Release 29Dec01 A2
See also:
More about "In Old Virginia: Slavery, Farming, and Society in the Journal of John Walker" by Claudia L. Bushman at Amazon.com
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