Miller Williams, Willard Gatewood and others had an idea in 1980. The University of Arkansas required an extra outlet to publish scholars’ work. A lack of publishing opportunities in Arkansas, along with a lack of attention to Arkansas’ history or culture were also reasons they felt Arkansas needed an additional outlet.
The University of Arkansas Press was established in the McIlroy House, Fayetteville’s renovated residence.
Brent Riffel’s stylized portrayion of this house is what became the UA Press Logo. This was for Central Arkansas Library System’s Encyclopedia of Arkansas. Initially, the press did not have enough staff or funding to produce its own material. Williams arranged with William King, the head of University of Missouri Press. Missouri would be the editor and producer.
The UA Press was not independent until 1983 when it began to operate. The first title was released in June 1981. It was entitled “The Governors of Arkansas Essays in Political Biography”, edited by Timothy Donovan, a UA historian.
Today I am looking through the 40 page 2022 catalog and I can see many titles that I wish to buy for myself as well as other books that I desire to gift as Christmas gifts. You wouldn’t know that the press has had a long and turbulent history based on its quality and quantity. The “little university presses that could” have been there for a long time.
McIlroy house caught fire on November 1983, causing staff to be forced out of their homes for over a year. The September 1987 fire in McIlroy House that destroyed many books and damaged a warehouse was also a factor. John White, the UA Chancellor, attempted to close down the publishing house in the 1990s.
It’s the tale of some of America’s most gifted people.
Arkansas and the determination of Arkansas to make UA Press a success. Williams and Gatewood are at the top of this list.
Williams was one of America’s most prominent poets of the 20th Century. He served as a UA professor for English, foreign languages, and comparative literature for 33 years. Fayetteville hosted a creative writing program that attracted writers from all parts of the country. Williams is the author, editor, or translator for more than thirty volumes of fiction, poetry, and literary criticism.
Williams was born April 30, 1930 in Hoxie. Williams was born in April 1930 at Hoxie. He moved a lot when he was a boy because he was the son a Methodist minister. He attended Fort Smith high school and graduated in 1947. He then entered Hendrix College in Conway as a freshman. He later transferred to the University of Central Arkansas. He was again transferred to Arkansas State University in Jonesboro. His first book of poetry, entitled “Et Cetera,” was published by Williams in 1952.
In 1951, he received a bachelor’s in biology from Jonesboro. Two years later, he earned a masters in zoology from UA. The next ten years were spent teaching biology. Williams studied briefly at the University of Mississippi’s Medical School while he was teaching biology at Millsaps College, Jackson, Miss.
Gatewood, his friend, wrote later that “In 1962, Flannery’s support helped him get a job at Louisiana State University’s English Department.” Williams joined Loyola University, New Orleans in 1962, and founded the New Orleans Review. He returned to UA in 1970 as a graduate student of creative writing and the English department.
His growing status in literature was evident in his many honors, which he won in the 1950s. These include the Henry Bellman Award for 1957, Breadloaf Writers Conference Fellowship for Poetics in 1961, Harvard University’s Amy Lowell Traveling Fellowship for poetry in 1963-64, New York Arts Fund Award for 1970, Fulbright Professorship for National University of Mexico 1970, Prix de Rome for Literature, 1976, and 1993 Charity Randall Award for Contribution Poetry as a Spoken Arts.
Williams was awarded the John William Cooper Award for Literary Excellence 1994, and the National Arts Award 1997.
Gatewood said that Williams was invited by the State Department to give lectures and readings during tours across several continents. He also mentored UA students. He was chosen by President Bill Clinton to read his poem, “Of History and Hope”, at the 1997 presidential inauguration. Williams said that he was a South child, a small-town farmer. He also benefited from his commitment to science over time, which was a key factor in his poetic creations.
Williams is remembered for having a broad imagination and using irony to convey subtlety and ambiguity. He was also known by a journalist as the Hank Williams American poet. Miller Williams won the Porter Prize’s Lifetime Achievement Award for 2009. Every year, the UA Press presents the Miller Williams Poetry Prize.
Williams died Jan. 1, 2015, at Fayetteville. His daughter Lucinda, despite his popularity as a poet and singer became more well-known as a songwriter. Numerous Grammy Awards were won for her. Time magazine dubbed her America’s Best Songwriter in 2002.
She wrote that her father had many writers friends as a child. “Eudora Welty was a friend of hers, and Flannery O’Connor is a famous writer friend who allowed Lucinda, five, to chase peacocks,” Philip Martin, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, said. By the age of 12, she had already written her own songs for guitar and performed in front of her parents. After a brief time at the UA, she became an itinerant performer, performing in Austin and Greenwich Village coffee houses, Nashville, Houston, and Houston.
Lucinda Williams performed at a benefit concert held in September 2007 for Miller Williams Poetry Prize.
Miller Williams was growing in Arkansas’ small towns, while Gatewood was raised in North Carolina on a tobacco plant. Gatewood was born in February 1931. His bachelor’s and master’s degrees, as well as his doctorate, were earned at Duke University. In 1957, he began his teaching career as a college teacher at East Tennesssee State University. Gatewood taught also at East Carolina University and North Carolina Wesleyan College, as well as the University of Georgia.
Gatewood arrived in Arkansas as the University’s first Alumni Distinguished Professor for History. This chair was endowed by its alumni association. The chair was his until his 1998 retirement. He served as UA chancellor from 1984 to 1985, taught hundreds of students and directed 25 doctoral theses. Some of his students were later to go on to be college history professors.
Tom DeBlack wrote, “During his tenure at UA Gatewood was awarded most of the major academic awards that the university gave to professors including the University Distinguished Research Award (1980) and the Chancellor’s Medal for Distinguished Service (94),” a fellow Arkansas historian. He was co-author, editor or author of more than 14 books. Many of his books are pioneering in African-American History.
Gatewood’s book “Aristocrats of Color, The Black Elite 1880-1920” was published in 1990 by UA Press and nominated to the National Book Award. Gatewood served as president of the Southern Historical Association from 1986 to 1987.
The essay collection was written by ex-students and former colleagues.
It was noted in the book’s introduction that there would be “no doubt” other outstanding teachers and scholars. However, all contributors to this book agree Dr. Willard B. Gatewood Jr. has been a brilliant teacher and scholar. His enthusiasm for and admiration of history is what we owe him.”
Gatewood was killed in a car accident on October 11, 2011. Gatewood died in October 2011. It sold over 10,000 copies within 10 months, and was widely praised by critics.
Gilchrist was born in Vicksburg, Miss. and graduated from Vanderbilt University. After earning her degree, Gilchrist went on to earn another from Millsaps. There she worked under Welty. Gilchrist, who did postgraduate creative writing work at UA from 1976 to 1979, was a contributor editor for the Vieux Carre Courier (New Orleans) and published her first poetry book.
Gilchrist decided that “The Land of Dreamy Dreams”, would be published by UA Press and not a commercial publisher. Its success led to a contract with Little, Brown & Co. She won the National Book Award for Fiction 1984 with her short story collection, entitled “Victory Over Japan.”
UA Press hired Stephanie Brown in July 1982, after Gilchrist’s short story collection, 1981. Williams was still responsible for the bulk of manuscript acquisitions. In February 1984, UA Press created a student award for writing. It opened a London office two years later. It established a journal department in 1988 that published scholary books.
Riffel said that UA Press “had established itself as one the most respected publishing houses for American poetry by the 1990s.” Riffel wrote that the press published several books with award-winning poetry, in addition to Frank Stanford’s posthumous works. … Because of Williams’ friendship, Jimmy Carter was a key figure in the list of writers during these years. Carter had the opportunity to explore a broad range of subjects through his writings in the media.
Carter published a variety of books, including “An Outdoor Journal”: Reflections and Adventures in 1988 and “The Blood of Abraham,” which reexamined the Camp David peace agreements of 1980.
White, who was appointed chancellor of the state in 1997, decided to shutter the press after it lost so much money. His decision sparked controversy statewide.
Riffel said that Gatewood, along with other Arkansans leaders launched a public campaign in response to the closure of its doors. White resigned in 1998 after admitting the misguided plan to shut down the press. With the funding of Tyson Foods Springdale, the media organization was able to transform itself into a non-profit entity and produce new titles.
The press appointed Lawrence Malley, a director, in 1998. This was part of the response to the establishment of the King Fahd Center of Middle East and Islamic Studies at the UA. The press made a significant contribution to Arkansas’ history in recent years with its Histories of Arkansas series. This series traces Arkansas’ past through modern times. Malley was retired in 2013, and Mike Bieker, former assistant director, became director.
The publishing house continues to be a strong focus on poetry, fiction, and books about the Middle East.
They continue to receive awards. Kathleen Condray was awarded the 2021 Booker Worthen Literary Prize for “Das Arkansas Echo”, a year in the life of Germans living in the Nineteenth-Century South. Kenneth Barnes received the 2022 J.G. Award for “The Ku Klux Klan 1920s Arkansas: How Protestant White Nationalism Came To Rule a Country” Arkansas Historical Association, Ragsdale Book Award
John Kirk, University of Arkansas at Little Rock’s history professor, released “Winthrop Rockefeller – From New Yorker To Arkansawyer 1912-1956”, earlier in the year. It is currently receiving praise.
Cherisse Jones-Branch, ASU historian and author of “Better Living by Their Own Bootstraps” (Black Women’s Activism In Rural Arkansas 1914-1965) also received positive reviews.
My winter reading list includes “Country Boy” by Colin Edward Woodward, and “Up South In the Ozarks” by Brooks Blevins of Izard Country.