In setting out to tell the story of Newton County, Arkansas, Aaron Smith consulted books, historians, and local legends. In 13 songs, he introduces listeners to generations of colorful characters, historical atrocities on large and small scales, and a folk opera about a man trying to find his lost sister.
“Newton County seemed like a magical place where big things could happen, a rough place where tough people settled,” Smith said, “As I started to hear stories, they just started to resonate with me.”
Sam Davis’ story was especially prominent. The Legend of Sam Davis plays out over the album’s final six songs and presents most of the story from the viewpoint of the titular character. There are moments of brilliance, like Davis’ desperate scramble to find “Bent Twigs and Hoof Prints” in tracking his sister after her possible kidnapping, and moments that are somewhat difficult to stomach, like Davis’ viewpoint that the Native American tribe took his sister “in the flower of her innocence.” The truth, Smith said, is likely more complicated.
“There’s a lot of reasons to doubt whether that’s a fact or not. There were people who left white society to live among Native Americans and that may have been what Sam Davis’ sister did and maybe it was an effort to save face that they framed that as her being abducted.”
Smith, a man of mostly white but some Native American descent, said he didn’t feel comfortable appropriating the story of Native Americans during the era his album was set. But he does convey the horrors of the Trail of Tears by singing about Henri Martain, a Frenchman who settled in Arkansas and married a Cherokee chief’s sister.
“He has Cherokee family and he sees what they were put through as very unjust,” Smith explained. “His family, from the time they settled in Newton County, made every effort to live as white people and be perceived as white as possible.”
While Smith uses terms like “half-breed,” it seems clear that he’s speaking as people then would have and not personally expressing those views. That’s further substantiated by “Looky There,” a song that allows Davis to speak but also contextualizes him as someone viewed as somewhat problematic even in his day. Still, Smith told me he has qualms about the way Native Americans are portrayed in the Sam Davis story even if he did eventually use a version of the story that Davis would’ve likely endorsed.
“It’s not about whether his sister was willingly or unwillingly taken into that life, but it’s really about how Sam deals with a world he can’t control,” Smith said.
Smith also had some worries about the role women played on his album, but he was able to write a couple of extra songs to make their story more complete.
“I realized all the women on this album so far have been kidnapped or murdered and we need to have some other stories,” Smith said.
Granny Brisco more than fit the bill as a strong woman, though Smith had to venture into the 1900s to tell her story. Brisco was a midwife who travelled on horseback to her clients and worked into her eighties. He also credits another song, “The Snow Child” to having reached out to a local historian for better stories about women.
“Women like [Brisco] have held it together for us for a long time, and she played a really important role and was a respected person in her area,” Smith said.
There’s no shortage of drama to be found in Newton County. “Ab Clayborn” tells the story of a man whose plan to commit a murder of revenge was foiled by the intended victim already having committed suicide. That didn’t stop him from unloading his gun into the body and setting fire to it. “Dead Man’s Hollow” shows a colder side to the community as a noticeably diseased man traveling through town was given no aid and ultimately left to die in the elements. Brothers “Curly and Tom” commit a murder, causing their family to flee to Colorado.
Each of these accounts are told beautifully. Contemporaneous viewpoints and values are woven into the songs while modern commentary exists in the narration. Even the music aids in the storytelling. “Ab Clayborn” benefits from hard strumming as gunshots. When Curly and Tom are revealed to have grown up rotten, the guitar strikes a decidedly sour note.
The album as a whole serves as one of the most enthusiastic and thorough local history lessons in existence. Though “Ab Clayborn” may have to be left out, it would be easy to imagine local schools calling Smith in to perform and share some of the rich context he learned in his research. It’s a wasted opportunity if he doesn’t.
Above is the full episode as aired on WUSB’s Country Pocket, including both my interview with Aaron Smith and the songs we discussed, starting with Henri Martain, which came along with a book about the Martain family. The interview begins afterward. You can hear the show live every Monday at 11am on WUSB 90.1 FM or check the blog to watch it as a YouTube playlist. Visit http://www.WUSB.fm and https://aaronsmithsongs.com for more.
Country Pocket 