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  • A History of Southland College: The Society of Friends and Black Education in Arkansas
  • Gregory P. Hinshaw
A History of Southland College: The Society of Friends and Black Education in Arkansas. By Thomas C. Kennedy. Fayetteville, Ark.: University of Arkansas Press, 2009. xii, 350 pp. Illustrations, notes, bibliography, and index. $39.95.

Thomas Kennedy, best known among those interested in Quaker history for his landmark work, British Quakerism, 1860–1920, recently published A History of Southland College: The Society of Friends and Black Education in Arkansas. This work is the first academic history to tell the story of Southland College, a Quaker school for African-Americans, near Helena, Arkansas, which functioned from 1864 until 1925 and was operated for most of its history by Indiana Yearly Meeting.

While there were other Quaker schools for African-Americans, none was exactly like Southland. The original vision of Southland was to proselytize freedmen with the hope of creating a black Quaker community in the South. At one time, an integrated Quaker monthly meeting, with three local congregations, functioned in conjunction with Southland.

As in his earlier works, Kennedy's scholarship is solid. His presentation is clear, and he does an admirable job of placing Southland College and its leaders in the larger Quaker context. Throughout the work, Kennedy juxtaposes the white Quaker world of Wayne County, Indiana, with the African-American world of Phillips County, Arkansas, in order to present the challenges that were faced in attempting to establish a black Quaker community so far from other Friends.

The white leaders of Southland play the largest role in Kennedy's book. Calvin and Alida Clark, Indiana Quakers who were the most responsible for the founding of the institution, dominate the early part of the book, as they undoubtedly dominated Southland's formative years. The role of Harry Wolford, also a white Quaker, who dominated the end of Southland, is also explored in detail, and Kennedy's characterization of him as an enigma is outstanding.

There is evidence that Kennedy is aware of the emerging scholarship on the racial views of nineteenth and twentieth century Gurneyite Orthodox Friends. While there are data to show that discriminatory (or at least patronizing) views on race dominated the actions of some Indiana Friends, Kennedy makes clear that most of the early white leaders of Southland were perfectly egalitarian in their racial ideals. Kennedy effectively demonstrates the nuance in Quaker racial views and shows how they changed over time, even at Southland. He does a fine job of demonstrating the inconsistency and equivocation that met the pleas of Southland's leaders to Indiana Friends. It seems that, depending upon the period and the local Indiana community, Southland was viewed as everything from a favored experiment to a step-child in a long list of missionary and philanthropic endeavors. Further exploration of the parallels and inconsistencies on race among Gurneyite Friends would, however, be in order.

Since Kennedy was fortunate to have access to the official records of Southland, including voluminous correspondence relating to the institution, he is able [End Page 65] to include a number of primary sources, including some from African-American parents. There are times, however, that the reader is left wondering what the African-American constituency of the school thought of various developments; however, such material to show this likely does not exist in large volume. In short, too much of the focus is on white leaders rather than upon the community that was being served.

There are a few occasional incorrect details and internal inconsistencies, most of which would be noticeable only to the most careful student of Indiana Quaker history, and none of which detract in any way from the larger story.

Kennedy's work fills a long-existing historical gap in the historiography of Orthodox Friends and race. It is constructed on solid scholarship and told in an interesting and compelling prose. Those who wish to know more about this area of Quaker history will not be disappointed in reading it.

Gregory P. Hinshaw
Winchester, Indiana
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