Imprint On Transparent For Web
  • Books
  • Catalogs
  • Series
  • Orders
  • For Authors
  • Contact
  • Support Us
  • Social Media
  • Sale
  • Login|Cart

Commonwealth of Compromise

Civil War Commemoration in Missouri

Amy Laurel Fluker

Commonwealth of Compromise

282 pages

Published: June 2020

6 photos, 1 map

ISBN: 9780826222084

Formats:

Hardcover
Digital download

Price: $35.00

BUY
About This Book
In this important new contribution to the historical literature, Amy Fluker offers a history of Civil War commemoration in Missouri, shifting focus away from the guerrilla war and devoting equal attention to Union, African American, and Confederate commemoration. She provides the most complete look yet at the construction of Civil War memory in Missouri, illuminating the particular challenges that shaped Civil War commemoration. As a slaveholding Union state on the Western frontier, Missouri found itself at odds with the popular narratives of Civil War memory developing in the North and the South. At the same time, the state’s deeply divided population clashed with one another as they tried to find meaning in their complicated and divisive history. As Missouri’s Civil War generation constructed and competed to control Civil War memory, they undertook a series of collaborative efforts that paved the way for reconciliation to a degree unmatched by other states.

Acts of Civil War commemoration have long been controversial and were never undertaken for objective purposes, but instead served to transmit particular values to future generations. Understanding this process lends informative context to contemporary debates about Civil War memory.

 
Authors and Editors
Amy Laurel Fluker is an Assistant Professor of U.S. history at Youngstown State University. She lives in Niles, Ohio.
Praise For This Book
“Dr. Fluker’s important new work makes welcome contributions to Missouri history, the history of the American West, and the developing scholarship of Civil War memory.” —Jeremy Neely, Missouri State University, author of The Border Between Them: Violence and Reconciliation on the Kansas-Missouri Line
 
“Amy Fluker’s extensive research on the tenor of reconciliation in Missouri emphasizes the complexities of community healing in a state where various regional identities—Western, Southern, and Northern—collided. She illuminates the conservative, yet pragmatic approaches of her subjects, explaining how there was no single narrative dictating how Missourians understood this conflict. Commonwealth of Compromise is a must read for anyone interested in the Civil War’s legacies.”—Kristen Epps, University of Central Arkansas, author of Slavery on the Periphery: The Kansas-Missouri Border in the Antebellum and Civil War Eras
“Fluker complicates our understanding of Civil War memory by examining a place, Missouri, that did not conform to simple categories of Lost Cause, Unionist, or emancipationist memories of the war. Instead Missourians fashioned a memory that allowed disparate groups to preserve elements of their unique memories in a larger reconciliationist framework.”—Nicole Etcheson, Ball State University, author of A Generation at War: The Civil War Era in a Northern Community
"An extraordinarily timely contribution to our current national dialogue over Confederacy celebrating statues, Confederate general named military bases, and the removal of the last Confedrate 'Stars & Bars' from the Mississippi state flag, Commonwealth of Compromise: Civil War Commemoration in Missouri is a work of original and meticulous scholarship that deserves being a part of every community, college, and university library, U.S. Civil War History in general, and 19th century Missouri History supplemental curriculum reading lists in particular."—Midwest Book Review
"Fluker’s writing is strong and clear; her grasp of the debates is exceptional; and she skillfully applies an impressive array of primary source materials."—Missouri Historical Review
“Commonwealth of Compromise is a wealth of knowledge, well written, and worth the read for anyone interested in Civil War commemoration and reconciliation.”—Annals of Iowa
"Civil War commemoration has become a heated issue in recent months. Names, statues, and other memorials of the Confederacy (and even some of the Union) have been questioned, defaced, hidden, or removed. Amy Laurel Fluker’s book on Missourians’ efforts to remember the Civil War could not be more timely."—Christopher M. Paine, Kansas History
 
"Commonwealth of Compromise hits all the right notes regarding tight editing, some appropriate photos, and excellent research."—Dave Page, The Journal of America’s Military Past

"Fluker provides a rich narrative that encourages scholars to dig deeper into the local variances and contested memories of the Civil War in American History. This book is an important contribution in 2020 and 2021."—Charles R. Welsko, The Journal of Southern History
Extras

U.S. Grant History Chat with Amy Fluker

Amy Laurel Fluker website

Ritter on Fluker, 'Commonwealth of Compromise: Civil War Commemoration in Missouri' | H-CivWar | H-Net

Books of Interest

Keep it Old-Time Hardcover  by Howard Wight Marshall

Keep it Old-Time

Fiddle Music in Missouri from the 1960s Folk Music Revival to the Present

Howard Wight Marshall

Left in the Midwest Hardcover  by Amanda L. Izzo

Left in the Midwest

St. Louis Progressive Activism in the 1960s and 1970s

Amanda L. Izzo

The Missouri Home Guard Hardcover  by Petra DeWitt

The Missouri Home Guard

Protecting the Home Front during the Great War

Petra DeWitt

Climbing the Ladder, Chasing the Dream Hardcover  by Candace O’Connor

Climbing the Ladder, Chasing the Dream

The History of Homer G. Phillips Hospital

Candace O’Connor

A Fire Bell in the Past Hardcover  by Jeffrey L. Pasley

A Fire Bell in the Past

The Missouri Crisis at 200, Volume II: “The Missouri Question” and Its Answers

Jeffrey L. Pasley

This Place of Promise Hardcover  by Gary R. Kremer

This Place of Promise

A Historian’s Perspective on 200 Years of Missouri History

Gary R. Kremer

A Fire Bell in the Past Hardcover  by Jeffrey L. Pasley

A Fire Bell in the Past

The Missouri Crisis at 200, Volume I, Western Slavery, National Impasse

Jeffrey L. Pasley

Contesting the Constitution Hardcover  by William S. Belko

Contesting the Constitution

Congress Debates the Missouri Crisis, 1819-1821

William S. Belko

The Names of John Gergen Hardcover  by Benjamin Moore

The Names of John Gergen

Immigrant Identities in Early Twentieth-Century St. Louis

Benjamin Moore

Benevolence, Moral Reform, Equality Hardcover  by K. David Hanzlick

Benevolence, Moral Reform, Equality

Women's Activism in Kansas City, 1870 to 1940

K. David Hanzlick

Calendar of Events

Join our email list

Like us

Follow us

Contact Us

Support the Press

Catalogs

Ordering Information

About Us

In partnership with the university, our mission is to advance the humanities and sciences. The University of Missouri Press is committed to publishing important books, including those unlikely to turn a profit for commercial publishers. As the only member of the Association of University Presses in Missouri, the Press is the state’s premier publisher of original and relevant peer-reviewed trade titles, textbooks, references, and monographs in disciplines served by the University of Missouri. We discover and disseminate knowledge through scholarly print and digital publications that will improve the quality of life—not only for all who call Missouri home, but for people across the nation and around the world.

© Curators of the University of Missouri.
All rights reserved. DMCA and other copyright information.
An equal opportunity/affirmative action institution.
Site Powered by Supadu