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This is a lively history of specific social, political, ad economic changes that all-out war brought to the home front in mid-America. Drawing from letters to the editor in local and state papers, from editorials, from personal interviews, and from the manuscript collections left by state political leaders, Calvin Smith brings into focus the impact of wartime not only upon agricultural and business economics but also upon particular social groups and the lives of individuals.

The war generated the beginnings of a rights revolution in black communities throughout the nation. The author takes a careful look at the resulting strain on relations between the state’s black and white citizens. No less important is the consideration of Japanese Americans from the West Coast who were relocated to camps in Arkansas, and of the Jehovah’s Witnesses who would not take part in the war effort either on the battlefield or at home.

War and Wartime Changes illuminates a fascinating and sometimes embarrassing segment of history which until now has not been presented in a single, cohesive work. The author details the unique experiences Arkansas had at this time as well as the patriotism its citizens felt for their country.

Here is the story for the historian, for every student of society and its ways, and for anyone who wants to understand or remember the patriotic fervor of Americans during World War II. Calvin Smith has created, with persistent and imaginative research, a rare admixture of nostalgia and solid scholarship.

Identifying distinct social groups of the past has always challenged archaeologists because understanding how people perceived their identity is critical to the reconstruction of social organization. Material culture has been the standard measure of distinction between groups, and the distribution of ceramics and other artifacts has often been used to define group boundaries. Western Pueblo Identities argues that such an approach is not always appropriate: demographic and historical factors may affect the extent to which material evidence can define such boundaries. Andrew Duff now examines a number of other factors—relationships among settlement size, regional population densities, the homogeneity of material culture, and local and long-distance exchange—in order to trace the history of interaction and the formation of group identity in east-central Arizona and west-central New Mexico from A.D. 1275 to 1400.

Using comparative data from the Upper Little Colorado and Zuni regions, Duff demonstrates differences in patterns of interaction within and between regions with different population densities. He then links these differences to such factors as occupational history, immigrant populations, the negotiation of social identities, and the emergence of new ritual systems. Following abandonments in the Four Corners area in the late 1200s, immigrants with different historical backgrounds occupied many Western Pueblo regions—in contrast to the Hopi and Zuni regions, which had more stable populations and deeper historical roots.

Duff uses chemical analyses of ceramics to document exchange among several communities within these regions, showing that people in less densely settled regions were actively recruited by residents of the Hopi and Zuni regions to join their settlements. By the time of the arrival of the Spaniards, two distinct social and territorial groups—the Hopi and Zuni peoples—had emerged from this scattering of communities. Duff's new interpretations, along with new data on ceramic exchange patterns, suggest that interaction is a better way to measure identity than more commonly used criteria. His work offers new perspectives on the role of ritual in social organization and on identity formation in Pueblo IV society and is rich in implications for the study of other sedentary, middle-range societies.

Why did the United States develop political parties? How and why do party alignments change? Are the party-centered elections of the past better for democratic politics than the candidate-centered elections of the present? In this landmark book, John Aldrich goes beyond the clamor of arguments over whether American political parties are in resurgence or decline and undertakes a wholesale reexamination of the foundations of the American party system.

Surveying three critical episodes in the development of American political parties—from their formation in the 1790s to the Civil War—Aldrich shows how parties serve to combat three fundamental problems of democracy: how to regulate the number of people seeking public office; how to mobilize voters; and how to achieve and maintain the majorities needed to accomplish goals once in office. Overcoming these obstacles, argues Aldrich, is possible only with political parties.

Aldrich brings this innovative account up to date by looking at the profound changes in the character of political parties since World War II. In the 1960s, he shows, parties started to become candidate-centered organizations that are servants to their office seekers and officeholders. Aldrich argues that this development has revitalized parties, making them stronger, and more vital, with well-defined cleavages and highly effective governing ability.