"The Story of Johnny Mack Brown" by Philip D. Beidler

E PUBLISHED

Fall1995

BY

THE

UNIVERSITY

Number38

OF

ALABAMA

$5.00

HERITAGE

Front Cover: Alabama's Johnrty Mack Brown became one ofthe nation's most popular Western movie stars. During the 1950s, Brown aLro starredin a comicbook series. See arti£/e, page 14. (Courtesy Dothan Landmarks Foundation)

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ALABAMA HERITAGE: FALL 1995

3

TABLE

OF

CONTENTS

RICKWOOD FIELD: GRAND LADY OF BASEBALL

6

By Paige utlinwright

THE STORY OF JOHNNY MACK BROWN

14

By Philip D. Beidler

TAMING THE COOSA

26

By Harvey H. Jackson III

ALABAMNSMOSTENDANGERED HISTORIC PLACES, 1995

34

By the Alabama Historical Commission and Alabama Preservation Alliance Endangered Historic Places Committee

DEPARTMENTS From the Archives The Nature Journal Notes and Queries Contributors, Sources, and Suggested Reading ALABAMA HERITAGE: FALL 1995

45 48 51 52 5

At home or at school, there was not a great deal of money. Johnny Mack recalled selling newspapers to buy a baseball Johnny Mack, who remained in Hollywood to beglove. (Later, after his first movie role come a cowboy movie hero. The Dothan boy never paired him with Marion Davies, protege forgot the homefolks and continued to be the idol of to an array of newspaper magnate William Randolph Alabama youngsters for decades. When he reHearst, Johnny Mack whimsically returned (at his own expense) to ride his pony in the 'Jolly, happ.y-gomarked, "You never know how far a newsAnnual Peanut Festival Parade in Dothan years lucky singing paper career will take you.") On tight later the smallfry mobbedhimjust as in 1925. budgets, the Brown football players made do with Boy Scout shoes cleated by the That is the basic legend. Moreover, local cobbler and a playing field "that when one recounts it, as Mark Twain Mack Brown's looked like it was sown with rocks." might say, one tells the truth, mainly. On the other hand, unlike most legends, this Odd jobs and equipment shortages notcharacter withstanding, high school football seems to one actually profits and deepens by adulteration of the facts. Johnny Mack Brown have paid rather generous college diviimage was represents an uncommonly full and fulfilldends for the Brown family. Five Brown ing story of celebrity at the intersection of brothers, of whom Johnny Mack was probalways one of a life with not one, but two, powerful myths ably not the most talented, were recruited of American manhood: In newspapers and by the University of Alabama. The eldest, rough, tough sporting publications across the land, Harry, began the dynasty by playing on the Brown found popular enshrinement along freshman team of 1920 before returning no-nonsense with such golden age heroes as Knute home to attend to family matters. Next Rockne and Red Grange as the latest Allwas Johnny Mack and then Tolbert, or hero."

American champion of the college grid"Red," who was described by Coach Wallace Wade as the best all-around footiron. And on the screen, during the heyball player in the family. Bill Brown was the day of the Hollywood cowboy, he inherited fourth.

And the fifth, Fred, prevented by injuries from playthe mantle of stardom from the legendary William S. Hart ing the college game, probably had the most potential: He and joined the Saturday-afternoon company of Tom Mix, was so good in high school that one of his game perforBuck Jones, Ken Maynard, Hoot Gibson, Gene Autry, and mances earned him an entry in Ripley s Believe It or Not. Roy Rogers as one of the most popular Western movie Johnny Mack distinguished himself in this talented entertainers of his era. group by making his way to early all-around athletic stardom. He excelled in high school track, baseball, and footTWAS A GOOD LIFE with happy beginnings. Born ball, earning all-state honors in the latter and the nickon September 1, 1904, in Dothan, Brown grew up in a name-the Dothan Antelope-that would follow him to big, closely knit family of nine children. His parentscollege. As to his landing at Alabama, apparently a number father Harry John Henry Brown, a shoe merchant, and of colleges recruited him, but his mother finally inclined mother Hattie McGillivray Brown-are described by him toward the university. It was a wise choice, for Alabama nearly everyone who remembers them as "easygoing" but gave Johnny Mack time to develop. This he was able to do intensely supportive. A cousin, Sarah Randall Cherry, recalls under his 1922 freshman mentor, Bully Van de Graaff, the house as a gathering place of brothers, sisters, relatives, Alabama's first All-American (1915), and the popular head friends, often with the focus of activity a windup Victrola coach, Xan Scott. and a lot of dancing.

Despite Scott's record-29-9-3 for four seasonsSports seem to have been a keen family interest. "We Alabama football remained largely unheralded on the were athletically inclined all the time ...We were always playing some kind of ball," recalled Johnny Mack's brother Johnny Mack Browns Hol/ywood career spanned someforty Billy. "We all played high school football, baseball, basketyears and im!uded roles in scores of Uf:stems, SU£h as the Sheriff of ball, and ran track. Our dad couldn't get any of us to work Medicine Bow (movie poster pictured, right). because we were always out playing ball."

And so "especially," had

of

cowpokes,

16 ALABAMA HERITAGE: FALL 1995

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A L A B A M A H E RI TAGE:

F A LL 1 995

17

national scene. Then, in 1923, Wallace Wade arrived from Vanderbilt. And from that year on, Brown began to make his own arrival as a player, in an evolving role described by his Hall-of-Fame induction narrative as "the key man in a period that saw the 11de win 25, lose 3 and tie 1." What was the key to the "key" role? The most obvious answer was uncanny natural ability. Fellow Hall-of-Fame inductee and teammate Wu Winslett, for instance, could only describe him as "one heckuva player, about as good as I have seen," adding also that Brown was "about the most humble individual I have ever been around. There was no arrogance about him, absolutely no egotism." Alabama Athletic Director Hank Crisp also tried to nail it down: "I don't know what kind of step he has, but it's something to see.

He can jump sideways and still not lose forward speed.

One man will not hem him in." Perhaps most compelling, however, is the testimon)~ according to Brown's sister, Elsa Brown Trexler, of a Washington player from the 1926 Rose Bowl she met years later. "I tried to catch him and tried to catch him," she recalls the man saying. "I think I'm still trying to catch him."

18 ALABAMA HERITAGE: FALL 1995

Johnny Made Brown, center, at the height ofhis Hollywood popu/an·ty, with Bob Baker, left, and sidekick Fuzzy Knight in a 1939 studio shotfrom Desperate Trails.

HATEVER THE GENIUS that made Brown run, he put it all on display in that dramatic third quarter in Pasadena. After Hubert's punt return and touchdown plunge following four tries at the goal line, Brown went to work on passes of forty-eight and sixtythree yards and then added on two inspiring runs. Yet, what put the magical touch on the occasion was the hero's lack of pretension about it all. On the first touchdown, he recalled, '1\11 I had to do was sidestep one man and I was across."

(The distance in question after the catch was twenty-five yards.) On the second, Brown unassumingly recounted the event: "When I reached the three, I looked back. Sure enough, the ball was coming down over my shoulder. I took it in stride, used my stiff arm on one man and went over carrying somebody. The place was really in an uproar."

What remains much less known is how hard Brown seems to have worked to devise commensurate skills on defense, this being an era when all-stars were expected to play on both sides of the ball. According to Wallace Wade, "Johnny Mack didn't play much his sophomore year because he wasn't a very good blocker or tackler. He was a great runner and a great pass receiver, but he was weak on defense. Until he became a good defensive player, we couldn't afford to play him. We had to have an all-around football player." Yet, Brown seems to have gotten good on defense and sometimes even great on defense when it counted. On that famous 1926 afternoon in Pasadena, for example, Brown, on defense, took issue with a celebrated member of the Washington offense, the All-American George Wilson.

According to Mark Kelley, a reporter from the Los Angeles Examiner:

generally known. In college, it turns out, besides excelling in football, Brown was an enthusiastic participant in on- and offcampus dramatics. He liked acting, knew he had the looks for it, and considered it a brother5, more-than-possible career. Roommate Luny Smith reported, "I can recall Mack of standing in front of a mirror, combing that wavy hair and dreaming out loud about becoming a movie star."

Brown had his first brush with the Mack was movies during the 1925 season, when a location crew, including actor-director George Fawcett, spent time in Birmingham making the movie, Men of Steel. As part of their visit, they received sideline passes as special guests at the AlabamaKentucky game of that year. Accounts insist that Fawcett observed Brown's athletic performance, recognized matineeidol potential when he saw it, and during a halftime conference urged Brown to visit California where Fawcett would The boy [Brown] had the speed of an antelope arrange a screen test. In another version, and the fight of a tiger. He took more rough however, Fawcett may have just told handling tlmn a house-mover can give a baby Brown to look him up. In any event, as grand and came bouncing batk for more. Once, I recalled by Brown's brother Billy, during recall, George Wilson stood Mr. Brown on hir the 1926 Rose Bowl visit, Brown, with head near the side-lines, twisted hir leg and gave him quite a tackle.

Wallace Wade's permission, had a screen test resulting in Two plays later George Wilson was present, but not voting. the offer of an MGM contract, which he repeatedly turned down through a series of negotiations lasting through the Most authoritative here, though, is Wallace Wade, again next year. "MGM continued to call him and send him putting a total performance into perspective by suggesting telegrams," said Billy. "Every time he refused, they would that Brown's most important contribution to the 1926 Rose offer him more money. It got so high that after the '26 season, he told his wife that he was going out there. They Bowl may have been a moment of defense. went out in 1927."

T# were one point aheatl and on the last play of the game and thir Brown himself later told a slightly different version of the screen-test and contract negotiations. This version great big powerful runner [George Wt/son] broke loose for a long focused on the 1927 Rose Bowl game, in which Alabama run. Johnny Mack was playing safety and Wt/son was eight to ten yardr beyond the line ofscrimmage before he ran into Johnny Mack. also participated. According to Brown, after his 1926 graduation and marriage to his college sweetheart, Cornelia Having had some questions in my mind about Johnny Mack's defenFoster, he began work in the insurance business but sive play in hir earlier days, I thought to myself, "UHI, there's our returned to the University of Alabama staff shortly therefootball game." But Johnny Mack went in there and matle as fine a after as an assistant coach. It was in the latter capacity that tackle as you've ever seen. In spite of the fact that he caught two he traveled to the 1927 Rose Bowl; and during that visit the touchdown passes in that game, stopping that big bull to save the crucial screen test took place. game for us was the thing that stood out mostfor me.

No matter how the Hollywood connection was made, the result became a matter of record. Brown signed a fiveThe Hollywood part of the story shortly ensued, and that year MGM contract and was carefully eased by the studio too involved a good deal more Alabama preparation than is

five Brown whom

Johnny

probably not the most talented,

were

recruited to

play football

at Alabama.

ALABAMA HERITAGE: FALL 1995

19

nations about the training regimen of small parts through which MGM was carefully breaking him in. At the same period, as all the studios negotiated the transition from silents to talki es, there were various accounts of his attempts, with voice experts, to discipline a drawl. In anticipation of musical roles, there was even the identification of a singing coach, one Francis Smith.

Meanwhile, Brown was coming upon his true forte, cowboy acting. And well he should have, for here he was both personally and historically a natural. On the first count, he was handsome, easygoing, and virile; and he was an extraordinary athlete. On the second, he was a son of the Old Southwest-the pre-Civil War frontier region out of which actually arose many of the character types, settings, and plots that we more generally associate with the post-Civil War West. This is to say that Brown had actually grown up in the land of the rough-and-ready frontier hero.

Indeed, according to Brown family researchers, an eighteenth-century ancestor-for whom Johnny Mack later named his own son, Lachlan-was the Scottish settler and trader Lachlan McGillivray, celebrated for his pioneer heroism and for his marriage to the beautiful Creek woman Sehoy. (Such genealogy was also said to account for Brown's natural fleetness of foot.) Even the Southern accent, which Brown's early mentors were at some pains to correct, suddenly became a realistic asset, since a goodly number of cowboys on the great postCivil War cattle drives out of Texas were ex-Confederates.

Johnny Mack Brown played a football hero with actor Robert Young in Saturday's Millions, a Universal Studios production. into an apprentice period. His debut came with bit parts in Slide, Kelly, Slide!, Mockery, After Midnight, and Bugle Call.

Interest was high. In the last, for instance, although it concerned post-Civil War Indian fighting, much was made at home of Brown's having to wear cavalry blue, a score not evened until 193 7 in Uf:lls Fargo, when he got to play a Confederate. Larger roles followed in The Fair Co-Rd with Marion Davies, Our Dancing Daughter with Joan Crawford, and others in a run of what Brown's old friend Winslett called "mush . " mOVIeS.

Meanwhile, Alabama newspapers carried stories revealing the affection and interest Brown retained among home people. Local media claimed him as one of theirs, and they followed his career avidly. Among "news" items were expla-

20

A L A B A M A H E R I T A G E : FA L L

made his Western

debut in 1930in Montana Moon. Again hisco-5tar was Joan

Crawford.

I995

ROWN MADE HIS Western debut in 1930 in Montana Jv!orm. Again his co-star was Joan Crawford. Appropriately, the film was something of a hybridization with the early " mush" scenarios. The plot involved Brown as a mild-mannered rancher who marries a spoiled heiress only to find her quickly bored by his simple western ways.

After his outburst of jealousy when he witnesses her involved in a passionate tango with Ricardo Cortez, she runs away and attempts to return by rail to the vain pleasures of the East. In the end, however, Brovvn recaptures her by holding up and boarding the train while he is disguised as a Mexican bandit.

Quickly, however, all previous performances were eclipsed as Brown reached instant Western stardom in Billy the Kid. Presumably in Hollywood's idea of apostolic succession, William S. Hart was engaged to teach Brown the finer points of gun twirling.

Hart also is said to have given Brown a six-shooter supposedly owned by the desperado himself. By another account, Will Rogers was enlisted to teach him how to lasso. Characteristically, even as he made it big, Brown thought of home, arranging for the premiere screening of the film classic to be held at the Barna Theater in Tuscaloosa.

According to movie historians, Bi!(y the Kid made movie history, \Vith Brown's performance still acclaimed as one of the definitive portrayals of the mythic figure. The desperado's up-against-the-wall philosophy of life, as espoused by Brown, seems to have anticipated James Dean. If nothing else, it surely must have made him dear to the hearts of audiences below the Mason-Dixon Line. As he put it succinctly, "I am a rebel."

In the next years, Brown was featured in two Western serials, Fighting 't0ith J{jt Carson (Mascot, 1933) and Rl!stlers of the Red Dog (Universal, 1935). He then began his own series of free-standing films when he signed with Supreme Pictures in 1935, making eight Supreme titles in 1935 and 1936 alone. Next, he went to Republic for eight more films.

In 1939 he began a new series of films for Universal, where he was paired with humorous sidekick Fuzzy Knight.

During this period, Brown was consistently ranked among the top ten cowboy stars and was popular enough to carry the occa<>ional novelty film, including the classic 1942 Ride 'Em Cowboy from Universal, where he played movie host to comedy team Abbott and Costello.

According to personal testimonies, Brown, the star, was especially admired and liked by those who worked with him, ranging from romantic co-leads such as Nell O'Day and Jennifer Holt to hard-bitten stuntmen such as Yakima Canutt. Invariably, the operative term was "gentleman." As to acting personality, he was also carving out a distinct niche.

As one chronicler put it, in contrast to an array of "jolly, happy-go-lucky singing cowpokes, Mack Brown's character image was always one of a rough, tough, no-nonsense hero, eager to bring about justice with an equally quick fist or trigger finger."

His popularity was also sufficient now to support a radio show, Under ~W?stern Skies, that ran from 1940 to 1950. And it was on this basis that he entered his long, classic 1943-52 relationship with Monogram. The product turned out to be no less than sixty-six films. The quality of the product,

The "8" Movie

F

OR THOSE INFORMALLY acquainted with the Hollywood system during the golden era, the "B" movie label is taken often as an index of production values distinguishing a film as automatically inferior to a "feature" film. Probably few movie historians would disagree with the idea as a general artistic distinction. They would certainly bridle at the notion, however, that a "B" picture was by its nature, cheap, shoddy, or cursorily made.

A feature film, then as now, was expensive and risky. On the other hand, a "B" film, then, was mainly a proven product, relatively inexpensive and quite reliable in its appeal to a certain constituency-average Depression- and World War II-era Americans who packed movie houses for welcome escapist entertainment.

The "B" movie-whether Western, comedy, horror or detective story, space or jungle adventure-was basically a popular screen genre and was meant to be predictable as to the basic elements of plot, character, setting, theme, dialogue, action, and cinematography. Audiences knew their favorite stars intimately and expected them to behave in character.

All of the above was surely the case with the most popular of all the "B" genres, the action Western. (Out of 530 Westerns made during the classic era, probably 500 were "B"s.) These were especially a godsend to the bleak Depression years, marrying escapism with a vision of wideopen spaces full of adventure and excitement. The plots were either inconsequential or improbable. The main events involved six-shooters, fistfights, and incredible stunt work, often on horseback. At twenty-five cents a show, they were genuine mass entertainment.

ALABAMA HERITAGE: FALL 1995

21

moreover, as summarized in a standard critical study of the movie Western, was notably high. "Brown," wrote the authors, was "a better actor than most Western stars." He was "a fine action performer, with an extremely likeable personality," and was regarded as "one of the very best of the post-1930 Western stars." Further testimony as to Brown's quality of acting and screen presence may be inferred by looking over a representative sample of the typical "B" Western plots over which he and his cohorts were frequently required to triumph: Here is Bad Man from Red Butte (Universal, 1940): '?\!-riving in a small western town, a cowboy is mistaken for his twin brother, who is a killer." In West of F./dorado (Monogram, 1949), "an outlaw gang tries to find the hiding place of loot stolen by one of the gang, who was killed by the man who has custody of the outlaw's kid brother, who knows the location of the money." In Blazing Bullets (Monogram, 1951), "a U.S. Marshall tries to find a man who has been kidnapped along with his gold bullion, since the man's daughter's fiance is suspected of the crime." And in Between Men (Supreme, 1935), "a young man heads west to find the rejected daughter of the man who raised him and not only finds her but his real father who had gone west after he thought the boy had been killed." In the last, the commentator found the featured fistfight between Brown and William Farnum a "corker."

By 1952 the Hollywood shift from "action" to "adult" Westerns was nearly complete and Brown, now fortyeight years old, arrived forthrightly at a decision to retire.

Fortunately, the new medium of television had begun ro do a land-office business in action Western reruns, and Brown remained popular during the fifties as the hero of a series of comic books in both American and British imprints, with Dell issuing more than twenty numbers between 1950 and 1959. (Roy Rogers and Gene Autry maintained comicbook runs considerably longer, with the former lasting seventeen years and 158 issues and the latter running eighteen years and 129 issues. Other competitors, however, such as Tom Mix, Red Ryder, Hopalong Cassidy, Tex Ritter, and Rex Allen faded more quickly than Brown.)

Not surprisingly, the format of Brown's comic books remained movie-like, with theater poster-style artwork on the front and, on the back, a full-page, informal photo of the "real" Johnny Mack Brown, relaxing on a set, practicing Western stunts, modeling a new set of handtooled boots, riding his horse Rebel. Teaser Jines continued to reflect the characteristic Brown plot: "The law held the trial ... and his gun upheld THE VERDIC'T." "His gun brought justice to a lawless trail." "He fought for the law ... with both fists!"

22 A L A B A M A H E R f T A G E : FA L L 1 9 9 5

Brown, who kept in touch throughout his life with thefolks bmk home, returntd in 1950for Dothan's Peanut Festival.

The price was ten cents. Most reliable guides would now list an early issue in good condition at fifteen dollars.

In retirement, Brown made occasional appearances in 1V series, including Perry Mason and 1a/es of l#/Lr; Fargo. He also returned to movies for small parts in The Bounty Hunter (1965), Requiem fora Gunfighter (1965), and Apadze Uprising (1966). By official count, he appeared in 168 films. If one adds in serial installments and appearances in later classics such as Wild J#jt Days (Universal, 1937), Fkuning Frontiers (Universal, 1938), and The Oregon Jrczi! (Universal, 1939), the total rises to around two hundred.

Brown's quiet, dignified exit from film was fully in character. Studio publicity materials emphasized his happiness as a devoted husband and father, with his wife, Connie, his son, John Lachlan, and his three daughters, Jane Harriet, Cynthia, and Sail)' One photo depicts the handsome couple in front of their Tudor-style Beverly Hills home. In others, he is shown at tennis with Harriet, football and skeet shooting with Lachlan. His own athletic hobbies included polo with Leslie Howard and Spencer Tracy; swimming with Duke Kahanomoka and Johnny Weismuller; duck-hunting

with Clark Gable and Charlie Starrett, the was described in appearance by a Dothan "Durango Kid." (An ex-Dartmouth football Eagle obituary as "portly, white-haired, and player turned Western star, Starrett supwearing a moustache." The photo published by the pape~; however, was from the posedly missed playing in the 1926 Rose height of his fame as a Western star, showBowl when Dartmouth declined the inviBrown tation then accepted by Alabama.) ing "the Johnny Mack that the world remembers," the dashing rider, pulling up In 1950 Brown returned to Dothan for returned to short and exhorting his mount, "Come on, the annual Peanut Festival, where he Dothan for gamely shared billing with the world's oldRebel. We'll head 'em off at the pass."

Brown knew that his life could have est peanut. New honors also came his way for his athletic achievements, including gone any number of ways. "I'd never rid1957 induction into the National Football den a horse before I got to Hollywood," he Featival, where Foundation Hall of Fame. Most important, once admitted, "but I'd ridden a lot of old however, was his 1969 induction, as a charmules. If I hadn't gone into pictures, I'd ter member, along with Paul Bryant, Shug probably either be in coaching or walking Jordan, Joe Louis, Don Hutson, and others behind some old mule somewhere." His shared billing sister Elsa put it acutely: From beginning into the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. The Montgomery Advertiser credited Brown, as to end "he just knew who John Mack with Brown was." the first of the group to be recognized, To picture Brown, there will always be a with setting the tone for the evening in a world's oldest treasure trove of family snapshots, newsshort, moving speech, "delivered in the paper photos, college yearbook portraits, soft, poetical voice of the longtime star of movie stills, theater posters, studio publicthe Hollywood cowboy movies." Of his ity promos, and comic-book covers. Every Hollywood heroics, he noted that in a lifepicture tells a story. Everyone will have a time of shootouts, he had been vanquished favorite. Of these, for people who identify Johnny Mack on the screen only three times, thereby posting a record 297 Brown with his home state as much as he seems to have marks in the win column. "But I treasure this more than done throughout his life, one photo stands out: a remarkanything," he concluded, "this coming back to be honored able shot from the 1926 Rose Bowl. And no, ironically, it is in such a manner." not an action shot. The heroic action for which he will be remembered, in fact, has not yet occurred. Rather it is a EANWHILE, IN HOLUWOOD, the photo of Brown taken at halftime, sitting relaxed, shoes off, Beverly Hills house had been rented out smiling a very big smile. One assumes that he may be relaxto various movie industry figures, and ing with teammates on the bench. Only on second glance then eventually sold to a friend. The does one see that he is seated among the spectators. He is Browns moved into the nearby Park La handsome, happy, a picture of shining young manhood. He Brea Apartments, and Johnny Mack took work as the looks exactly like the gridiron stalwart from a good college celebrity-host at a posh restaurant called "The Tail of the football movie who might rise in the moment of crisis to Cock," cast in the seemingly over-the-hill role of greeting its game-winning heroics and then manage to stay humble and affluent clientele. (By poignant coincidence, another living generous about it all. On the other hand, he looks as if he legend and charter inductee into the Alabama Hall of Fame, might be an ideal choice to play the young good guy in a the boxing champion Joe Louis, was by that time doing simWestern, the one who traps the rustlers, clears his father's ilar work at a casino in Las Vegas.) Yet, the sale of the house name, perhaps, or marries the rancher's daughter. And if he seems to have occurred because the children had grown up, becomes prosperous and well-known as a movie cowboy, he and, in a situation of inevitably diminished film-work, the looks as if he will handle that too with grace. In the fullest job seems largely to have been a choice of late-life employsense of the phrase, he is nearly anybody's picture of the Allment that appealed to Brown's natural geniality. As his sister American.

Whoever he is or may turn out to be, the photoElsa Brown Trexler phrased it, "He just liked people." graph makes one thing clear: At the moment, the young At the time of his death from kidney disease on ~ man pictured is truly having the time of his life.

November 14, 1974, in Woodland Hills, California, Brown

n1950

the Peanut he gamely the

peanut.

A L A B A :vi A H E R I T A G E : F A L L

1995

23

CONTRIBUTORS, AND

SUGGESTED

RICKWOOD FIELD: GRAND LADY OF BASEBALL

By Paige Wainwright

P

AIGE WAINWRIGHT is assistant director at Sloss furnaces National Historic Landmark. A native of Birmingham, Wainwright has a master's degree in American history from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Her interest in baseball goes back to the great New York Yankee teams of the 1950s and to her own years as an avid softball player.

For more information on Rickwood Fleld, see, Bob Carlton, "Rickwood's Friends Driven by Passion for Old Park," Birmingham News (May23, 1993): 13A Tim Cary; "Slidin' and Ridin': At Home and on the Road with the 1948 Birmingham Black Barons," AhbatmZ Heritage (Fall 1986): 20-33.

Doug Cress, "Of Ghosts and Memories," Atlanta Journal/Constitution (May 15, 1994): M6.

Mark Inabinett, "Big Time Baseball: Alabamians in the Major Leagues," Alabama Heritage (Summer 1993): 26-39.

Willie Mays with Lou Sahadi, Say Hey: The Autobiography ofWt!lieMays (New York: Pocket Books, 1988).

Zipp Newman, The House of Barons (Birmingham, AL: Cather Brothers, 1948).

Zipp Newman and Frank McGowan, Fifty Years of Professional Baseball (Birmingham, AL: Cather Brothers, 1950).

Ted Pratt, "500-foot Homer Became Stuff of Rickwood Legend," Birmingham News (May23, 1993): 13A

THE STORY OF JOHNNY MACK BROWN

By Philip D. Beidler

P

HIL BEIDLER, professor of English at the University of Alabama, grew up with Saturday afternoon cowboy movies and reports having no difficulty relating to All-American good-guy heroes like Johnny Mack Brown. The chance to research Brown's life, says Beidler, was "especially welcome" because it led him into

52 A L A B A M A H E R I T A G E : FA L L 1 9 9 5

SOURCES, READING

the arena of twentieth-century American culture where Beidler feels at home, having written book-length studies of Vietnam, the sixties, and, most recently, World War II classic films.

The author wishes to express his thanks for the help offered by members of the Brown family and by the staff of the Paul W Bryant Museum in the preparation of this article.

For more information on Johnny Mack Brown, see: Mike Bolton, "Johnny Mack Brown," 'BatmZ: Inside the Crimson Ttde, (September 15, 1979): 8-9, 12.

Al Browning, Bowl 'Batml Bowl.· A Crimson Tide Football Tradition (Huntsville, Alabama: Strode Publishers, 1987).

Tommy Ford, 'BatmZ Under Bear: AhbatmZ's Family Tides (Huntsville: Strode Publishers, 1982).

TAMING THE COOSA

By Harvey H. Jackson III

H

ARVEY JACKSON, professor and head of the Department of History at Jacksonville State University, is a frequent contributor to AhbatmZ Heritage. His articles "The Mitcham War," the story of a violent political struggle in 1890s Clarke County, appeared in Ahbatml Heritage issue 25, and "Philip Henry Gosse: An Englishman in the Alabama Black Belt" appeared in issue 28.

"Taming the Coosa" is an outgrowth of Jackson's research for Rivers of History: Life on the Coosa, Talhpoosa, Cahaba, and Alabama, recently published by The University of Alabama Press. [For more information, contact The University of Alabama Press, P. 0. Box 87380, Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0380, (205) 348-5180.]

Jackson is currently working on a book tentatively titled "Putting 'Loafing Streams' to Work: The Building of Lay, Mitchell, Martin, and Jordan Dams (1910 to 1929)," which he is writing for the Alabama Power Company.

FOr further reading, see: D. Gregory Jeane, Evaluation of Engineering Cultural Resources: Lock No. 3, Coosa River, AlabatmZ (U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Mobile District, 1981).

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