The record for longest Arkansas literary widowhood belongs to Bernie Babcock. Her husband died in 1898 and she lived until 1962: 64 years.
Coming in a close second, at 58 years, is Margaret Smith Ross, best known for her "Chronicles of Arkansas" column, which ran in the Arkansas Gazette from 1958 to 1967. Ross lived until 2002. Her husband, Edwin Lee Ross, died in Normandy on July 4, 1944, 28 days after the Allied invasion.
In her 2002 interview with Roy Reed for the Arkansas Gazette oral history project, Ross mentions her reluctance to celebrate Independence Day: "I got a little more than I bargained for on that one." There is no note of self-pity. In the interview, Ross comes across as the kind of lady of a certain age who is always sought out by seasoned party-goers: attractive, hilarious, and ready to dish.
So let's grant Margaret Ross her reprieve from Independence Day celebrations, and ask ourselves what was going on in the place we now call Arkansas on July 4, 1776. Or on July 2, 1776, when the Second Continental Congress actually declared independence from Great Britain.
The Louisiana Territory on both sides of the Mississippi River technically passed from France to Spain under the secret Treaty of Fontainebleau in 1762. Under the Treaty of Paris, which ended the Seven Years' War in 1763, Great Britain took the Louisiana Territory east of the Mississippi, while France pretended to retain Louisiana west of the Mississippi, and also New Orleans.
In short, French colonial officials were kept in the dark, and Antonio de Ulloa, the first Spanish governor of Louisiana, did not arrive in New Orleans until 1766. Quapaw leaders were kept in the dark, too.
French Creoles in New Orleans revolted against Spanish rule. Ulloa departed, and in 1769, General Alejandro O'Reilly, with his marvelous name, arrived to take control of the colony. For the sake of military expediency during the Seven Years' War, French bureaucrats had directed that Arkansas Post be moved down the Arkansas River and to the south side, to a site rendered un-farmable by frequent floods.
French commandants persisted at the swampy southernmost location of Arkansas Post after the formal Spanish takeover. Captain Joseph Orieta was the first Spaniard to take command of Arkansas Post when he raised the flag of Spain there on Jan. 1, 1771. Orieta was still in charge at the Post in 1776.
What about the Quapaws? Historians think the Quapaws were about 500 people around 1776, with three villages near the mouth of the Arkansas. For almost a century, they had maintained a special, mutually beneficial relationship with the French. With healthy self-interest, they probed colonial officials for assurance of continuity.
In early 1768, when Frenchman Alexandre deClouet took charge of Arkansas Post on behalf of the Spanish, the Quapaws wanted to know if "two hearts were one"--if they could expect the same sort of relationship with the Spanish that they had enjoyed with the French.
Imagine things from the Quapaw perspective in 1770: Any living member of the tribe would remember having dealt with the French. As colonial relationships go, it was a good one. They exchanged goods, services, knowledge, and protection. They engaged in rituals, such as smoking the calumet and passing it around.
So they wanted to know what the newcomers, the Spanish, were all about. And some Quapaw leaders, not necessarily with the support of the people beneath them, began to probe relationships across the Mississippi, with aliens and long-time enemies alike: the English and the Chickasaw.
The English established a fort at Concordia, Miss., within spying distance of Arkansas Post. The Spanish recognized that the English were well within their rights to do so, which is not to say that the Spanish liked it.
Enter Angaska, the Say McIntosh of 18th-century Arkansas, at least in terms of his capacity for public drama. In 1776, Angaska, chief of one of the Arkansas villages, took 14 families with him across the Mississippi to visit the Tunica people and Englishman John Thomas. Thomas had endured a shaky career in English colonial administration, and acting on behalf of "his Britannic majesty," gave Angaska a medal and an English flag.
When Angaska got back to Arkansas Post, Captain Orieta, the commandant, said (more or less), "What are you doing with this stuff?" In other words, why have you been across the river and accepting potent symbolic gifts from our enemy?
Angaska unfurled his English flag and threw his medal to the ground.
More to come, and meanwhile, happy Independence Day.
For a better account of the events described above, see "The Quapaws and the American Revolution" by Morris S. Arnold; Arkansas Historical Quarterly, Vol. 79, No. 1, Spring 2020.