Robert L. Dorman – författare

Myths and Mysteries of Oklahoma reveals the dark and ominous cloud of mysteries and myths that hovers over the Sooner State. This book offers residents, travelers, history buffs, and ghost hunters a refreshingingly lively collection of stories about Oklahoma's unsolved murders, legendary villains, lingering ghosts, terrifying myths, and haunted places.

In this masterful biography, Robert L. Dorman traces the career of William H. 'Alfalfa Bill' Murray from his hardscrabble childhood in post-Civil War Texas to his remarkable ascendancy as a nationally known political figure in the mid-twentieth century. The first comprehensive portrait of Murray to be published in fifty years, Alfalfa Bill is both the exploration of a larger-than-life personality and an illuminating account of the birth of political conservatism in Oklahoma. As Dorman reveals, no political label readily fit Murray. The core conservatism of his Texas years was caught up in the ferment of three major periods of American reform - the Populist uprising, the Progressive Era, and the New Deal. Over his long career, Murray strongly advocated for states' rights, limited government, and strict constitutionalism, yet he was also a consistent foe of corporations and concentrated wealth. The society he sought was small-scale, decentralized, agrarian - and racially segregated. Although he claimed to represent high principles, Murray as a politician was an opportunist, loved a good fight, had a flair for the theatrical, and hungered for power. Dorman depicts Murray from his days as a political operative in the Chickasaw Nation to his leadership of the Oklahoma Constitutional Convention, and from the Speaker's chair of the Oklahoma legislature to the halls of Congress. The book follows Murray's quixotic attempt to found an agricultural colony in Bolivia, and chronicles his amazing Oklahoma comeback in the 93 gubernatorial election. The final chapters detail Murray's legendary term as state governor, his failed candidacy for president, and his emergence as a fierce critic of New Deal liberalism and racial desegregation. Unlike earlier biographies of Murray, Alfalfa Bill brings issues of race, class, and gender to the forefront, often in surprising ways. On the surface, the Murray saga was an American success story, yet his rise came at a price for Murray himself, his family, and the people of the state he helped to create. An indelible portrait emerges of an ambitious, domineering, relentless, and unapologetically racist figure whose tarnished legacy seems painfully relevant in America's current political climate.

The careers and ideas of four figures of monumental importance in the history of American conservation--George Perkins Marsh, Henry David Thoreau, John Muir, and John Wesley Powell--are explored in A Word for Nature . Robert Dorman offers lively portraits of each of these early environmental advocates, who witnessed firsthand the impact of economic expansion and industrial revolution on fragile landscapes from the forests of New England to the mountains of the West. By examining the nineteenth-century world in which the four men lived--its society, economy, politics, and culture--Dorman sheds light on the roots of American environmentalism. He provides an overview of the early decades of both resource conservation and wilderness preservation, discussing how Marsh, Thoreau, Muir, and Powell helped define the issues that began changing the nation's attitudes toward its environment by the early twentieth century. Dorman's readings of works including Marsh's Man and Nature , Thoreau's The Maine Woods , Muir's The Mountains of California , and Powell's Report on the Lands of the Arid Region reveal their authors' influence on environmental thought and politics even up to the present day. |Traces the careers and ideas of four of America's early environmental advocates: George Perkins Marsh, Henry David Thoreau, John Muir, and John Wesley Powell.