According to many sources the practice of “trick or treating” began with a Celtic tradition. The Celts thought that by dressing up as evil spirits, they would be protected if they happened to encounter a demon who roamed the earth as we moved from one year to the next. The term “trick or treating” has a much more recent history. According to Smithsonian magazine, the earliest known printed reference is found in a November 1927 edition of the Blackie Herald (Alberta, Canada):

Hallowe’en provided an opportunity for real strenuous fun. No real damage was done except to the temper of some who had to hunt for wagon wheels, gates, wagons, barrels, etc., much of which decorated the front street. The youthful tormentors were at back door and front demanding edible plunder by the word “trick or treat” to which the inmates gladly responded and sent the robbers away rejoicing.

In 1909, Samuel Cornish founded the Collegeville Manufacturing Company in Collegeville, Pennsylvania. The company first made aprons, but soon began making American flags as well. In 1923, they further expanded to include making inexpensive Halloween costumes using fabric remnants from the flag-making process. Soon costume-making became a dedicated branch of the Cornish enterprise as the Collegeville Costume Company.

Throughout the years, Collegeville’s line of costumes included pop culture figures of the day. The 1976 Collegeville catalog featured costumes celebrating the Bicentennial and related to the blockbuster movie Jaws. During the 1980s, Peanuts and Transfomers characters were popular Collegeville costumes. Today, Collegeville no longer makes Halloween costumes, but the Cornish family still operates a retail costume store in Royersford, Pennsylvania.

Aaron Loehndorf is the Shiloh Museum’s collections and education specialist.

The very fragile skeleton costume laid out for careful cleaning before storage in an acid-free box.

This skeleton costume was donated by the estate of longtime Hindsville (Madison County) resident Patricia Laird Vaughan. She married James Vaughan, whose family first came to Madison County in 1831. In addition to farming, raising cattle, and running one of the largest fescue seed operations in Arkansas, James and Patricia Vaughan also owned and operated two well-known Hindsville businesses: the Valley Inn Café and Vaughan Valley Antique Shop.

The costume box is stamped as size “Junior (16)” with a penciled-in cost of $2.98. Unfortunately, we do not know if this costume was worn by a child in the Vaughan family, or if it was a item the Vaughans had for sale in their antique store.

According to many sources the practice of “trick or treating” began with a Celtic tradition. The Celts thought that by dressing up as evil spirits, they would be protected if they happened to encounter a demon who roamed the earth as we moved from one year to the next. The term “trick or treating” has a much more recent history. According to Smithsonian magazine, the earliest known printed reference is found in a November 1927 edition of the Blackie Herald (Alberta, Canada):

Hallowe’en provided an opportunity for real strenuous fun. No real damage was done except to the temper of some who had to hunt for wagon wheels, gates, wagons, barrels, etc., much of which decorated the front street. The youthful tormentors were at back door and front demanding edible plunder by the word “trick or treat” to which the inmates gladly responded and sent the robbers away rejoicing.

In 1909, Samuel Cornish founded the Collegeville Manufacturing Company in Collegeville, Pennsylvania. The company first made aprons, but soon began making American flags as well. In 1923, they further expanded to include making inexpensive Halloween costumes using fabric remnants from the flag-making process. Soon costume-making became a dedicated branch of the Cornish enterprise as the Collegeville Costume Company.

Throughout the years, Collegeville’s line of costumes included pop culture figures of the day. The 1976 Collegeville catalog featured costumes celebrating the Bicentennial and related to the blockbuster movie Jaws. During the 1980s, Peanuts and Transfomers characters were popular Collegeville costumes. Today, Collegeville no longer makes Halloween costumes, but the Cornish family still operates a retail costume store in Royersford, Pennsylvania.

Aaron Loehndorf is the Shiloh Museum’s collections and education specialist.

Tontitown Grapers baseball team at Mantegani Park in Tontitown, circa 1945. From left: Abe Pianalto, Virgil Verucchi Jr., Williard Moon, Paul Pianalto, Bill Fiori, Guy Bariola. Veronica Keith Collection (S-2006-44-5)

A couple years ago I went to my first-ever minor league professional baseball game. It immediately began a love affair that I thought might wane, but it really has not. I went to my first major league game last summer and loved every moment of it. Sadly, this year I have been watching replays of previous games and following players on Twitter and Instagram. We will not discuss the teams (nor sports, nor players) I follow because I understand just how passionate people are about their favorites, but the experience reminds me of an article I read as an undergrad about baseball magic and the incredibly dedicated and detailed rituals players and fans engage in to ensure a win. Next time you watch a basketball player take a free-throw or a pitcher set up, watch for their routine. You won’t be able to unsee it once you find it.

A while back, museum outreach coordinator Susan Young proposed that Aaron Loehndorf (the museum’s collections/education specialist and arguably the biggest baseball fan among the museum staff) and I come up with an “Shiloh Sandwiched-In” program on a local sports topic. Before we agreed to the idea, we wanted to be sure enough material was available to put a program together. Of course there was. Our research focused on the most common form of baseball magic—mascots. Ultimately the Sandwiched-In talk was sidelined and the research went into files on my external hard drive. But the topic stayed in the back of my mind for a long time. If I came across a new team while I was working on something else, I made a note or took a picture with my phone and added the information to my spreadsheet. And then it just sat there. Until now.

Tontitown Grapers baseball team at Mantegani Park in Tontitown, circa 1945. From left: Abe Pianalto, Virgil Verucchi Jr., Williard Moon, Paul Pianalto, Bill Fiori, Guy Bariola. Veronica Keith Collection (S-2006-44-5)

A couple years ago I went to my first-ever minor league professional baseball game. It immediately began a love affair that I thought might wane, but it really has not. I went to my first major league game last summer and loved every moment of it. Sadly, this year I have been watching replays of previous games and following players on Twitter and Instagram. We will not discuss the teams (nor sports, nor players) I follow because I understand just how passionate people are about their favorites, but the experience reminds me of an article I read as an undergrad about baseball magic and the incredibly dedicated and detailed rituals players and fans engage in to ensure a win. Next time you watch a basketball player take a free-throw or a pitcher set up, watch for their routine. You won’t be able to unsee it once you find it.

A while back, museum outreach coordinator Susan Young proposed that Aaron Loehndorf (the museum’s collections/education specialist and arguably the biggest baseball fan among the museum staff) and I come up with an “Shiloh Sandwiched-In” program on a local sports topic. Before we agreed to the idea, we wanted to be sure enough material was available to put a program together. Of course there was. Our research focused on the most common form of baseball magic—mascots. Ultimately the Sandwiched-In talk was sidelined and the research went into files on my external hard drive. But the topic stayed in the back of my mind for a long time. If I came across a new team while I was working on something else, I made a note or took a picture with my phone and added the information to my spreadsheet. And then it just sat there. Until now.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines the word mascot as “a person or thing that is supposed to bring good luck; (now) esp. something carried or displayed for this purpose. Also: a thing (often an animal or personified character) used by an organization, esp. a sports team, as a symbol or for good luck; an emblem.” The origin of the word is French and first appeared in 1867 in an operetta by Edmond Audran. (This operetta was first performed in 1880, if you would like to know.)

Mascots have evolved in many ways. Early mascots for baseball, for example, were young boys who sat with the team. Now they can be Mudhens, Celery Stalks, or Gus the Pioneer (Gentry Public Schools, Benton County.) Mascots provide entertainment and encourage engagement with the crowds. They dance, they interact directly with fans, and often have a ritual of their own  their team scores. Mascots have even been controversial, most recently with teams using Native American nomenclature. And what if your team has the same mascot as another? Ahem, Fayetteville and Springdale: both towns have used the Bulldog as their mascot for decades. This sparked a friendly rivalry and newspaper accounts differentiated by calling them by the team color (purple for Fayetteville, red for Springdale) rather than Bulldogs when they published a retelling of games between the two teams.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines the word mascot as “a person or thing that is supposed to bring good luck; (now) esp. something carried or displayed for this purpose. Also: a thing (often an animal or personified character) used by an organization, esp. a sports team, as a symbol or for good luck; an emblem.” The origin of the word is French and first appeared in 1867 in an operetta by Edmond Audran. (This operetta was first performed in 1880, if you would like to know.)

Bentonville baseball team, circa 1912. The team was part of a regional African-American league ranging from Fort Smith, Arkansas, to Joplin, Missouri. Back, from left: Thad Wayne, Marion “Sonny” Finney, and Lloyd Trout. Front, from left: Yates Claypool, Virge Black, and John Barker. Elizabeth Robertson Collection (S-95-7-42)

Mascots have evolved in many ways. Early mascots for baseball, for example, were young boys who sat with the team. Now they can be Mudhens, Celery Stalks, or Gus the Pioneer (Gentry Public Schools, Benton County.) Mascots provide entertainment and encourage engagement with the crowds. They dance, they interact directly with fans, and often have a ritual of their own  their team scores. Mascots have even been controversial, most recently with teams using Native American nomenclature. And what if your team has the same mascot as another? Ahem, Fayetteville and Springdale: both towns have used the Bulldog as their mascot for decades. This sparked a friendly rivalry and newspaper accounts differentiated by calling them by the team color (purple for Fayetteville, red for Springdale) rather than Bulldogs when they published a retelling of games between the two teams.

It is not just the mascot that evolved, but the sports and organizations themselves. Over the years, we’ve had our school teams of course, but we also had town teams that would sometimes take on the school team. On July 30, 1937, the Fayetteville Daily Democrat reported on the local WPA baseball league: Greenland beat Tontitown, and Springdale was scheduled to play Fayetteville the following day. We also had professional teams that might play for a season or two and then disappear. These pro teams were funded by local businessmen. And one of the most important changes to sports was desegregation of teams and leagues.

Lest you think I refer to baseball mascots only, I would like to report that on July 14, 1967, the Springdale News recounted a football game between the local police department (the Fuzz) and the fire department (the Hose Jockeys).

Some sports played on the local level were obscure, or so I thought. Does anyone know what shinskinner hockey is? I found this mentioned in one article from 1929. When I did some initial Google-searching I came up with the Bruins. These guys are hockey players today, but once upon a time, there was a soccer team called the Bruins. But in this instance? Basketball, boys and girls. Shinskinner hockey referred to basketball.

Below is the data I have collected thus far, with a lot of help from Aaron. I hope you enjoy exploring the variety of mascots Northwest Arkansas has seen over the years!

Rachel Whitaker is the Shiloh Museum’s research specialist.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines the word mascot as “a person or thing that is supposed to bring good luck; (now) esp. something carried or displayed for this purpose. Also: a thing (often an animal or personified character) used by an organization, esp. a sports team, as a symbol or for good luck; an emblem.” The origin of the word is French and first appeared in 1867 in an operetta by Edmond Audran. (This operetta was first performed in 1880, if you would like to know.)

Bentonville baseball team, circa 1912. The team was part of a regional African-American league ranging from Fort Smith, Arkansas, to Joplin, Missouri. Back, from left: Thad Wayne, Marion “Sonny” Finney, and Lloyd Trout. Front, from left: Yates Claypool, Virge Black, and John Barker. Elizabeth Robertson Collection (S-95-7-42)

Mascots have evolved in many ways. Early mascots for baseball, for example, were young boys who sat with the team. Now they can be Mudhens, Celery Stalks, or Gus the Pioneer (Gentry Public Schools, Benton County.) Mascots provide entertainment and encourage engagement with the crowds. They dance, they interact directly with fans, and often have a ritual of their own  their team scores. Mascots have even been controversial, most recently with teams using Native American nomenclature. And what if your team has the same mascot as another? Ahem, Fayetteville and Springdale: both towns have used the Bulldog as their mascot for decades. This sparked a friendly rivalry and newspaper accounts differentiated by calling them by the team color (purple for Fayetteville, red for Springdale) rather than Bulldogs when they published a retelling of games between the two teams.

It is not just the mascot that evolved, but the sports and organizations themselves. Over the years, we’ve had our school teams of course, but we also had town teams that would sometimes take on the school team. On July 30, 1937, the Fayetteville Daily Democrat reported on the local WPA baseball league: Greenland beat Tontitown, and Springdale was scheduled to play Fayetteville the following day. We also had professional teams that might play for a season or two and then disappear. These pro teams were funded by local businessmen. And one of the most important changes to sports was desegregation of teams and leagues.

Lest you think I refer to baseball mascots only, I would like to report that on July 14, 1967, the Springdale News recounted a football game between the local police department (the Fuzz) and the fire department (the Hose Jockeys).

Some sports played on the local level were obscure, or so I thought. Does anyone know what shinskinner hockey is? I found this mentioned in one article from 1929. When I did some initial Google-searching I came up with the Bruins. These guys are hockey players today, but once upon a time, there was a soccer team called the Bruins. But in this instance? Basketball, boys and girls. Shinskinner hockey referred to basketball.

Below is the data I have collected thus far, with a lot of help from Aaron. I hope you enjoy exploring the variety of mascots Northwest Arkansas has seen over the years!

Rachel Whitaker is the Shiloh Museum’s research specialist.

Note: Thanks to our museum photographer, Bo Williams, for filming Paul’s Blue Ox in action.

When cataloging an artifact, many aspects of it can be extremely helpful in determining how it was used, where it came from, and the date range of manufacture and/or use. A family history of that artifact can fill in many of those blanks. Artifacts that are stamped with company information, and, in some cases, a patent number, can give us a very specific date range to go from. However, when that patent number does not match a patent resembling the artifact in question, it becomes even more challenging to figure out a date. Such was the case with a recent donation from the Patricia Laird Vaughan estate of “Paul’s Blue Ox,” a toy made by Multipl-aktion Toy Company in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Paul’s Blue Ox is a “ball-actuated” toy:  marbles roll down the back of the ox until a lumberjack type figure rises up, knocks the marble off of between the ox’s horns, and dumps it on the tray at the bottom of the toy. Paul’s Blue Ox came to us in its original box. Printed on the box is patent number 1791217. A patent search on the internet linked that number to a European patent for female and male connector circuitry, not for a toy from the 1940s (that date was my educated guess).

Next I turned to a web search to find information about the Multipl-aktion Toy Company. The search engine kept trying to tell me the company name was “Multiple-Action” Toy Company, which was not the name I was looking for. I was able to find one web listing for the toy with the same patent number which dated the toy as 1931 but yielded no other new information. I also located an entry in the 1944 Minneapolis city directory for the “Multipl Aktion Toy Company” with salesmen David Ackerberg and Sidney Rivkin listed as company officers.

With nothing to show for my sleuthing but limited bits of information on the Blue Ox, I reluctantly moved on to another artifact from the same donor—a toy xylophone. The xylophone’s patent numbers proved quite helpful, and the numbers started with a “US” prefix. I finished cataloging the xylophone, then, on a whim, I went back to the Blue Ox patents. I decided to try the patent search again, this time adding “US” to the patent number. This led me to a 1929 patent for a liquid-vending machine issued to Sidney L. Long of Minneapolis, Minnesota—same location as the Multipl-aktion Toy Company, but the time period was a bit early and the patent was not for a Blue Ox toy.

I delved deeper into the other patents submitted by Sidney L. Long, and there, finally, I found a ball-actuated toy, patent number 2434571, filed August 29, 1945. That patent is for a toy that looks almost identical to the Blue Ox.

Even though an erroneous patent number led to several dead ends, it still provided valuable information for finally tracking down the correct patent for Paul’s Blue Ox.

Aaron Loehndorf is the Shiloh Museum’s collections and education specialist.

Shiloh Museum collections and education specialist Aaron Loehndorf greets Ed Stilley at the Instruments of Faith exhibit reception, March 30, 2019.

There is a saying, “all good things must come to an end.” On January 13,2020, our Instruments of Faith exhibit on the life and work of folk instrument maker Ed Stilley will close. For me, it was truly a blessing to curate the exhibit, and it will be bittersweet as I take it down.

Early in the exhibit creation process, I was fortunate enough to meet folk musicians Kelly and Donna Mulhollan, friends of the Stilley family. The assistance and support from Kelly and Donna made the exhibit possible, and they made the work enjoyable. Kelly and Donna introduced me to Ed Stilley and his wife, Eliza.  Meeting the Stilleys is still an awe-inspiring moment for me. They are some of the nicest people I have ever met as they welcomed me into their home. I have never met anyone like Ed—forceful yet quiet, reserved yet expressive. The fact that I had the chance to spend time with him during the course of the exhibit was the highlight of the entire process.

Museum exhibits frequently cover topics from the past or about individuals that are no longer with us. Telling someone else’s story, especially while they’re still alive, can be daunting. I had some concerns about how the exhibit would be received, especially since at the heart of Ed Stilley’s life story is his response to a vision he said he received from God. It’s a very personal story. I wanted to present it to the public in a meaningful, respectful way. Overall, I could not be happier with how Instruments of Faith turned out and the rave reviews we’ve received from visitors. There might be one or two minor tweaks—things I would have done differently—but all in all, I am happy with it.

Ed Stilley signs a copy of his biography, True Faith, True Light, as author Kelly Mulhollan looks on. Stilley and Mulhollan were attending the museum’s Instrument of Faith exhibit reception on March 30, 2019.

While Ed Stilley stopped making instruments a few years ago due to poor health, he and his family joyfully attended the Instruments of Faith exhibit opening on March 30, 2019. Ed sang a hymn for the audience and also signed copies of his biography, True Faith, True Light, written by Kelly Mulhollan and published by the University of Arkansas Press. I think for all those in attendance, being in the same room with Ed Stilley, getting the chance to shake his hand, was a very moving experience. I believe the exhibit reception was Ed’s last public appearance. He passed away on June 12, 2019.

Soon the Ed Stilley instruments will come down, the tools in his replica tool shed will be put away, and the life-size photo of Rose the mule will find a new home. I wish I had words to do justice about what this experience has meant to me, but I am at a loss. It was truly a life changing process to be a part of, and I will carry the memories and experiences for the rest of my life. Thank you once again to all the individuals who loaned their Stilley instruments for the exhibit. Another thank you to all who came to see the exhibit and took time to share their impressions with us. (It is always nice to hear positive comments from the people that the museum serves.) Finally, a special thank you to Kelly and Donna Mulhollan, and to the entire Stilley family for entrusting me with Ed’s story. I hope you feel that I did it justice.

Aaron Loehndorf is the Shiloh Museum’s collections and education specialist.

Southern Hotel on the southeast corner of Holcomb and Meadow in downtown Springdale, early 1900s.

Note: Vance Randolph (1892–1980) was a folklorist whose writings on the traditional Ozark culture were published from the 1920s through the 1970s in collections such as Ozark Folksongs, Ozark Superstitions, and Down in the Holler: A Gallery of Ozark Folk Speech, among others. 

In 1968 the Shiloh Museum was given a guest register from Springdale’s Southern Hotel. Joe Robinson, a Springdale businessman and a founding board member of the Shiloh Museum, recovered the ledger after the old hotel building was torn down as part of Springdale’s urban renewal program. (Urban renewal was a federal program that ran from 1950s to the 1970s that sought to renovate towns and cities nationwide by removing rundown buildings and homes to make way for new development.)

Flora and Henry B. Rice opened the Southern Hotel in 1920 in a converted house on the southeast corner of Holcomb Street and Meadow Avenue. Their customers came from as far away as New York and as close as Springdale (the locals were mostly extended-stay boarders.) The hotel’s claim to fame was Flora Rice’s delectable home-style meals. In 1935 the Rices moved to another, smaller, converted house on the corner Main Street and Grove Avenue where they ran the Southern until the early 1960s. The building on Holcomb became the Alvin Hotel, which operated until 1966. It also was torn down during urban renewal.

Southern Hotel dining room, early 1900s.

The Southern Hotel register is a big item, about the size of a cement block and just as heavy (it seems). In my thirty-five years as collections manager I have had to build it a custom storage box and move it a few times for re-shelving purposes. From time to time I would turn its pages and think how interesting it might be make a list of all the names to see who stopped at the hotel back in the day. Other projects kept it on the back burner until this year when Michele Gibson, our front desk receptionist, volunteered to take on the task. So in between her front desk and gift shop duties she has been transcribing eleven years (from 1920 to 1931) of Southern Hotel guest signatures. That’s 4015 days, multiple listings per day, and often with challenging handwriting. We’re at over 14,000 names and counting.

On the very first day of the project, on the very first page of the ledger—May 4, 1920—we had our first surprise. There on the page was “Vance Randolph, Kansas City.” What!? Was this the noted Ozark folklorist Vance Randolph? To confirm that it might be him, Michele looked for his autograph online to compare the signature. It was not his signature. But then we noticed that the hand that wrote “Vance Randolph” had written the name above it on the register, “N. R. Tripp,” also from Kansas City. And they were both booked for Room 9. We theorized that Tripp and Randolph were traveling together.

But how to confirm this? The first place to look was in Robert Cochran’s definitive biography, Vance Randolph, An Ozark Life, which lays out Randolph’s life in great detail. Randolph, born in 1892, was raised in Pittsburg, Kansas. By 1920 he had completed most of his education with a B.A. in biology and M.A. in psychology. He applied to do graduate studies on Ozark Mountain people under pioneer anthropologist Franz Boas at Columbia, but those plans fell apart when Randolph couldn’t get Boas interested in the project.

Vance Randolph when he was a high school biology teacher in Pittsburg, Kansas, 1916.

In the years leading up to 1920 Randolph had dabbled in Socialist politics, briefly worked as an insurance salesman and high school teacher, served in the Army during WWI, and traveled the country. He had also started to write, some of his first work appearing signed and unsigned in pre-war editions of Appeal to Reason, a Socialist newspaper published in Pittsburg, Kansas. Cochran writes, “By late spring, 1920 Randolph seems to have returned to Pittsburg from his East Coast wanderings—he was apparently in St. Louis on February 23—and evidently spent much of his time over in the Ozarks. There are song citations from May, June, and July, a three-month break in the late summer and fall, and then more citations for November and December.”

So now I knew roughly about Vance Randolph’s activities in 1920, but what about N. R. Tripp? Turning back to Cochran’s book I checked the index and there I found an entry for one Newell R. Tripp. But wait a minute; it was listed in quotes as one of Vance Randolph’s pseudonyms. A quick check in the book revealed that it was a nom de plume that Randolph used in the mid-1920s. Randolph and Tripp visited Springdale in 1920.

It was time to track down the real Newell R. Tripp.

Thanks to Ancestry.com, finding Newell Richard Tripp didn’t take long. The first thing that popped up was the 1920 census showing him living in Joplin, Missouri, married, and working as a traveling salesman for a wholesale drug company. A few more clicks and I had found his connection to Vance. Tripp was born in Kansas in 1889 and spent some years in the Kansas cities of Beloit and Lawrence. From 1914 to 1917 he lived in Pittsburg, Kansas, like Randolph. And, like Randolph, he was drafted into service in July 1917.

So now I had Tripp and Randolph in the same town at the same time and that might have been enough, with so much time passed, to assume some kind of an acquaintance between the two. But then, while searching through issues of the Pittsburg Daily Headlight at Newspapers.com, I found two articles that revealed their connection. First was an article from 1917 regarding Tripp’s deferment from service (he had a dependent wife and child) that also detailed his life in Pittsburg before he was drafted. Besides his job at a local pharmacy and as a traveling salesman, turns out Tripp, like Randolph, was active in the local Socialist party. In fact, he ran for justice of the peace on the Socialist ticket. Surely they had crossed paths there. One more article finally proved their acquaintance. In the “Local Mention” column of the June 5, 1916, issue of the Headlight the following notice appeared:

Pittsburg Daily Headlight, June 6, 1916.

So Randolph and Tripp were buddies in Pittsburg before the war and afterwards. In 1920, although they lived in different states, they met up again for a series of trips to Springdale. But for what purpose? Was Tripp, the traveling salesman, out on sales calls with Randolph tagging along? Who knows? They stopped at the Southern Hotel on May 4, August 17 and 18, and September 28. Issues of the Springdale News around those dates had nothing to report. But then, a traveling salesman on his rounds would not necessarily be newsworthy. And as regards Vance Randolph, it would be another 10-20 years before he would gain recognition as folklorist of the Ozarks.

Cochran wrote that Vance Randolph considered 1920 a watershed year in his life, the one that set him on the path for his life’s work. In December 1920 Randolph bought a cabin in Pineville, Missouri. It became his base for many years as he began to collect and write about Ozark songs, dialect, and culture. His first published work on Ozarks culture, “A Word-list from the Ozarks,” appeared in Dialect Notes of the American Dialect Society in 1927.

In his work as a freelance writer on a myriad of non-Ozark topics, Vance Randolph sometimes used pseudonyms. Under the name “Newell R. Tripp,” Randolph authored The ABC of Chemistry for Vanguard Press in 1924 and Behaviorism: The Newest Psychology (circa 1925) for the Little Blue Book paperback series published by E. Haldeman-Julius. (And just to “put a bow on it,” Haldeman-Julius was also a Socialist Party buddy of Randolph.) I wonder if the real Newell R. Tripp ever knew that his name was used as a pen name by his friend, Vance Randolph?

Vance Randolph returned to Springdale at least one more time in his career. In February 1942 he came to town to collect and record folksongs from Maggie Glover Morgan, which would be published in his book Ozark Folksongs in 1946.

Carolyn Reno is the Shiloh Museum’s assistant director and collections manager.