Promises Kept: A Memoir

Promises Kept: A Memoir is the autobiography of Governor Sidney Sanders McMath (1912–2003), one of the most significant public figures in Arkansas history. The book was published by the University of Arkansas Press in 2003, toward the end of McMath’s life, and re-issued in paperback by UA Press in 2026. Running 476 pages in the hardcover edition, it includes more than sixty illustrations. The book won the 2004 Ragsdale Award and the 2006 Booker Worthen Literary Prize.

The book’s foreword was written by David Pryor, another significant figure in the state’s history. Writing that no one had a greater or more positive impact on the state than McMath, Pryor adds, “Promises Kept is an intimate accounting of his meaningful and exciting adventure.” Pryor also notes that, amid the losses and tragedy that scarred McMath’s life, in the book there is a “total absence of bitterness or malice.”

From McMath’s humble beginnings in rural southern Arkansas, he became an officer in the U.S. Marine Corps, a prosecuting attorney, a political figure, and an attorney. Some readers may be surprised to discover that only six years of McMath’s ninety-year life were spent in elective office because he seemed to cast a much longer shadow. After a timeline of milestones, the book is divided into sections titled Roots, Duty Calls, Politics and After, and Conclusion, with an appendix titled Cases That Made a Difference.

McMath offers a lengthy family history that begins with ancestors who lived before the American Revolution. He cites first-hand witnesses to the Civil War along with letters from the 1870s that shed light on the lives of rural people in southern Arkansas. When an elderly matriarch in his family heard that, in the course of one of his political campaigns, he shook hands with so many people that his right hand became swollen, she advised McMath that she would not worry as long as it was not his head.

Noting places the family lived during his early childhood, McMath offers a tour of such southern Arkansas hamlets as Bussey (Columbia County), Foreman (Little River County), and Taylor (Columbia County). He moved to Hot Springs (Garland County) when he was ten years old. A number of Hot Springs landmarks are featured in the narrative, including the Arlington Hotel, Bathhouse Row, Central Avenue, Oaklawn Racetrack, and West Mountain. He shares the delight on his tenth birthday at seeing Hot Springs’s Whittington Avenue, the first paved road he had ever encountered, exclaiming to his sister in his way of speaking at the time, “Suster, look’a heah. Heah is a sidewalk in the plumb middle of the street!”

Growing to young manhood, he was inspired to join the U.S. Marine Corps. McMath vividly brings to life his experiences during the bloody battles of the South Pacific during World War II at such places as Guadalcanal. His singular bravery (while crediting other brave young men) earned numerous decorations, including the Silver Star for valor in combat and the Legion of Merit for exceptionally meritorious conduct. His actions also won battlefield promotions, with him ultimately reaching the rank of major general. In the book, he acknowledges them graciously but with no self-aggrandizement.

His entry into Arkansas politics was a battle in itself, even though his conversational tone in the book remains understated. McMath recounts the corruption in the municipal government of his hometown of Hot Springs. Leading the “GI Revolt” of returning veterans, he covers the reality of life in a town built on illegal gambling, which McMath did not consider a “victimless crime.” An opponent of the entrenched administration might confront the mortgage on their home being revoked, have their business shut down for violating an obscure (or possibly non-existent) ordinance, or even be locked up in jail as a “troublemaker,” leaving the rest of the family to fend for themselves. While he was campaigning for prosecuting attorney, McMath’s wife and children were stalked when they went out, being telephoned anonymously each evening with a full recounting of where they went so there could be no doubt that they had been followed. The sheer nastiness of elections was surpassed only by what McMath justifiably calls the “Greek tragedy” that plagued his family.

After smear campaigns against him as governor and a painful loss in his run for the U.S. Senate, he writes simply, “The election was very close but we lost the battle.” As recounted in the book, in later years a former political enemy told McMath, “You must hate me.” The response from McMath was, “I do not hate you—I hate no man.”

McMath’s coverage of his later career as an attorney includes fifteen influential cases he was involved with. With details associated with death and/or horrific injuries suffered by the “little guy,” the cases are heart-wrenching. McMath writes in the final paragraph: “My life, Dear Reader, has been truly blessed: to be an advocate for justice in a court of law, to be a voice for justice in the political arena, to battle for justice as a soldier; there is no higher calling, no greater reward.”

Among reviews of the book is one by veteran Arkansas journalist Ernest Dumas, who wrote that McMath spent the last seven years of his life compiling the memoir, “upon which he expended almost his last breath (he died at the age of ninety-one on the night of the first book signing).”

For additional information:
Brantley, Max. “Remembering Sid McMath.” Arkansas Times, June 13, 2012. https://arktimes.com/arkansas-blog/2012/06/13/remembering-sid-mcmath (accessed September 30, 2026).

Dumas, Ernest. The Education of Ernie Dumas: Chronicles of the Arkansas Political Mind. Little Rock: Butler Center Books, 2019.

Kendall, Cassidy. “Veteran Journalist Dumas Recounts Story Behind Latest Book for GCHS.” Hot Springs Sentinel-Record, January 22, 2020. https://www.hotsr.com/news/2020/jan/22/veteran-journalist-dumas-recounts-story/ (accessed September 30, 2026).

McMath, Sidney S. Promises Kept: A Memoir. Fayetteville: ‎University of Arkansas Press, 2003.

Nancy Hendricks
Garland County Historical Society