Summer 1993, Issue 29

Article Abstracts and Supplements

Osceola: The Man Behind the Myths
By Patricia R. Wickman

Though he eventually chose to live with the Creeks in Florida, the legendary figure Osceola had both Creek and European heritage. Newspapers raved about Osceola’s exploits against the United States Army in the Second Seminole War, even going so far as to call him invincible. Forced into a permanent game of hide-and-seek with the U.S. government, when Osceola was eventually captured, he quickly succumbed to malaria and died. As Patricia R. Wickman notes, the legend of Osceola did not end with Second Seminole War. This remarkable man’s story lives on in American mythology.



The Loeb Collection of First Period Worcester
By Louise Joyner

Within the walls of the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts lies the Loeb porcelain collection, fifty-one unique pieces of porcelain produced by the Worcester Company. Now called “Royal Worcester,” the company is well known for its use of soft-paste porcelain and its durable glaze. The beautiful, uncracked china has endured over two centuries of wear and reveals the merits of the Worcester product.



Souvenirs from the Grand Tour
By Jeff Mansell

When newlyweds Ivey and Kate Lewis took their Grand Tour across Europe, they made a list of the paintings they wished to be copied and brought home with them. Jeff Mansell observes that their list of religious, mythological, and landscape paintings ranged in style and nationality. For many years these paintings graced the walls of the Lewis’s Marengo County home, Bleak House. The Bleak House collection survived the Civil War as well as several location changes, only to be split upon Kate Lewis’s death in 1925. Today only fourteen of these paintings, adorned with gold-leaf frames, have been located.



Big Time Baseball: Alabamians in the Major Leagues
By Mark Inabinett

Though Alabama was slow to warm up to the idea of baseball, once minor leagues were established in the state, there was no stopping Alabamians from breaking records. Today, Alabama sits behind only New York, California, and Pennsylvania in native players inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Mark Inabinett recounts the ways in which Alabama has shaped the course of baseball, producing such legends as Satchell Paige, Willie Mays, and Hank Aaron, from Charlie “Home Run” Duffee to Bo Jackson.