Gender: Male - Starting with B

Brownderville, Greg Alan

Arkansas poet Greg Alan Brownderville has published three award-winning books of poetry and folklore and created a “go-show” called Fire Bones. He is a full professor in the Department of English at Southern Methodist University (SMU) in Dallas, Texas, and is editor-in-chief of the Southwest Review. Greg Brownderville was born on October 10, 1976, in a Jonesboro (Craighead County) hospital. He grew up with his brother and sister in the small close-knit Woodruff County community of Pumpkin Bend, where generations of his family lived and farmed. His father, Alton Brownderville, was a farmer and later owned a funeral home. His mother, Janie Woodall Brownderville, worked at the county library and later was secretary to the elementary principal at McCrory (Woodruff …

Brownlee, Robert

Robert Brownlee was a Scottish stonemason who lived in Little Rock (Pulaski County) from 1837 to 1849. He helped build the first statehouse in Arkansas and several other historic landmarks in Pulaski County. Robert Brownlee was born on April 24, 1813, in Bonkle, Cambusnethan Parish, a tiny community in the Scottish lowlands. He was ninth in a family of seven sons and four daughters born to Margaret and Alexander Brownlee. After a basic education at Murdestoun Estate School near Bonkle, he apprenticed to his older brother, William, a stonecutter. Brownlee was twenty-three when he read about the December 1835 fire that almost destroyed New York City and the need for mechanics to help rebuild the city. That same day, he …

Brownsville to Arkansas Post, Expedition from

The December 7–13, 1864, Union scouting expedition from Brownsville (Lonoke County) to Arkansas Post (Arkansas County) was undertaken to hunt down guerrillas who had been firing on Union shipping on the Arkansas River and to seize beef cattle for the Federal army. On December 6, 1864, Brigadier General Eugene A. Carr ordered a detachment of 200 men from the garrison at Brownsville to ride toward Arkansas Post “for the purpose of driving out the bushwhackers in that region and bringing in beef cattle.” Carr noted that one party of twenty-five guerrillas had fired on boats near the post “and there is said to be some squads of bushwhackers between the Bayou Metoe [sic] and the Arkansas.” Major Gilbert J. Hudson …

Brownsville to Cotton Plant, Expedition from

The scouting expedition from Brownsville (Lonoke County) to Cotton Plant (Woodruff County) began as an effort to gauge the level of Union support around Madison (St. Francis County). On October 25, 1864, Brigadier General Joseph R. West ordered Major George T. Snelling of the Tenth Illinois Cavalry Regiment to take 200 men from his regiment and go from Brownsville to the White River, where a boat would transport them across and they would ride on to Madison. “The scout was not deemed a military scout, but rather a political scout,” Snelling reported, adding that “there would be an election held in Madison to see if there were any Union men in that locality or not.” West ordered Snelling to return …

Brownsville to Fairview, Expedition from

The November 28–December 9, 1864, scouting expedition from Brownsville (Lonoke County) to Fairview (White County) was mainly conducted to clear guerrillas from north-central Arkansas and to requisition livestock for use by Union forces. Brigadier General Eugene A. Carr issued explicit orders for a scouting expedition on November 24, 1864, calling for 500 Union cavalrymen to clear “out the rebels and guerrillas northeast of Searcy and between Little Red and White Rivers.” The scouts were to seize “all good beeves” they could find and send them to Little Rock (Pulaski County), giving the owners receipts they would use to get paid “unless…notorious rebels.” Carr stressed that the Federals should conduct themselves responsibly and that the commander should “inflict summary punishment on …

Brownsville, Scout from (January 17–19, 1864)

A party of Union soldiers from Brownsville (Lonoke County) headed north on January 17, 1864, to connect with the Third Missouri Cavalry Regiment (US) in Searcy (White County), apparently to deliver orders for the Missourians to report to Little Rock (Pulaski County). The Third Missouri Cavalry had been stationed at Jacksonport (Jackson County) but moved its station to Searcy on January 10, 1864. Four days later, it sent a contingent of soldiers from Company M under Lieutenant Francis Hyatt to the Little Red River to meet a steamboat that was supposed to deliver supplies. After determining that the boat had turned back, the troopers headed back toward the rest of the regiment. They encountered a band of twenty bushwhackers led …

Brownsville, Scout from (June 27–29, 1864)

The scout from Brownsville (Lonoke County) was conducted to ascertain the number of Confederate troops located between the White and Mississippi rivers in the days after Brigadier General Joseph O. Shelby attacked and sank the USS Queen City at Clarendon (Monroe County). Shelby and his troops had been active in eastern Arkansas for about a month by June 1864, and Federal officials were on edge following an attack on Union troops  based at the mouth of the White River on June 22. When Shelby’s forces sank the Queen City on June 24, some 2,750 U.S. infantry and cavalry were sent in pursuit, depleting the forces based at DeValls Bluff (Prairie County) and potentially making Little Rock (Pulaski County) vulnerable to …

Broyles, Frank

aka: John Franklin Broyles
After beginning his administrative career as an assistant coach at Baylor University in 1947, John Franklin (Frank) Broyles became one of the most familiar and powerful figures in all of college sports. In his years at the University of Arkansas (UA) in Fayetteville (Washington County), he built a diverse and excellent athletics program, plus a system of world-class athletic facilities in addition to establishing a winning tradition that includes the most football victories as head coach in Razorbacks history: 144 wins, far ahead of the runner-up coach, Lou Holtz, whose teams won sixty. Frank Broyles was born on December 26, 1924, in Decatur, Georgia, to O. T. Broyles and Louise Solms Broyles. Broyles became a star quarterback at Georgia Tech, where he …

Bruce, William Harvey (Harve)

Harve Bruce was a moonshiner who resided on Oak Mountain in Van Buren County. Pursued by local and federal authorities, Bruce shot and killed two U.S. marshals, although his sentences for moonshining were longer than his sentence for killing the marshals.  William Harvey (Harve) Bruce was born on June 23, 1847, to William and Sarah Bruce of Georgia. The family moved to Winston County, Alabama, to earn money through tenant farming. However, the Civil War began soon after, and his father joined the Confederate army. Without any financial support, his mother moved the family closer to relatives in Cherokee County, North Carolina. Two years into the fighting, Harve Bruce joined the Confederate army after turning sixteen. Serving for the remainder of the war, he fought in the infantry division Company D, Thomas’s Legion, led by Colonel William Holland Thomas. This was one of the few regiments in which Cherokee and …

Bruhin, Joseph Aloysius

Ceramic artist Joseph Aloysius Bruhin III of Fox (Stone County) was awarded the Arkansas Arts Council Fellowship in 1992 and has been the recipient and winner of numerous “best of show” awards. Nationally, Bruhin figures among two dozen potters who are recognized as specializing in wood-fired pottery. He is the first contemporary potter to work continuously with a wood-fired kiln in Arkansas. Joe Bruhin was born on April 7, 1953, in St. Louis, Missouri, to Virginia Bruhin and Joseph Aloysius Bruhin Jr., an electrician; he was one of four boys. At age fifteen, Bruhin was hitchhiking and backpacking to the western states of Colorado, California, and Washington. He graduated from high school in 1971 and spent some time exploring Florida …

Brumley, Albert Edward

Albert Edward Brumley Sr. was one of the most successful American gospel song composers of the twentieth century, penning such standards as “I’ll Fly Away,” “I’ll Meet You in the Morning,” “If We Never Meet Again,” “Turn Your Radio On,” and many others. Between 1926 and 1931, he studied, lived, and worked at the Hartford Music Company in Hartford (Sebastian County) under the tutelage of its founder, Eugene Monroe (E. M.) Bartlett. Although Bartlett died in 1941, Brumley forever credited him as the chief mentor and inspiration behind his music and eventually purchased the Hartford Music Company in 1948. Albert E. Brumley was born on October 29, 1905, in Indian Territory near present-day Spiro, Oklahoma. His parents, William Sherman Brumley …

Brundidge, Stephen, Jr.

Stephen Brundidge Jr. was a prosecuting attorney, a member of the Democratic State Central Committee, and a six-term U.S. Representative for the Sixth and Second Congressional districts. Born on January 1, 1857, in Searcy (White County), Brundidge was the fourth child of Stephen and Minerva Brundidge, who moved to Searcy from Mississippi in 1853. His father was a contractor who built the first brick buildings in Searcy, including the main section of the present White County Courthouse, built in 1869. Brundidge graduated with honors from the Searcy Male and Female Academy. He then read law in the offices of William R. Coody and Dandridge McRae and was admitted to the bar in 1879. He first practiced law in Jacksonport (Jackson …

Brushy Island Riots of 1915–1917

The area known as Brushy Island lies within the municipal boundaries of Sherwood (Pulaski County) and was the site of what newspapers described as a series of “race riots” starting in 1915. The violence, primarily represented as being between groups of white and Black farmers in the area, in many respects constituted more an ongoing feud than any sort of riot, however. A January 4, 1917, report in the Arkansas Gazette on the “riots” described Brushy Island as consisting of “several hundred acres almost completely surrounded by bayous. The land was at one time covered with a dense forest, which has been cut away, leaving the Island dotted with stumps.” Newspaper reports of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries …

Bryan, Leon L. “Doc”

Leon L. “Doc” Bryan was an influential figure in the Arkansas House of Representatives in the final third of the twentieth century. A Democrat, he served for almost thirty years, his tenure ending with his death in office. Leon L. Bryan was born on January 31, 1920, in Coal Hill (Johnson County) to Arthur Hershell Bryan and Gertrude Elnora Jennings Bryan. Bryan grew up in Coal Hill and attended the local schools, graduating from Coal Hill High School in 1939. An outstanding athlete, he was a member of Coal Hill High School’s state championship basketball team. After graduation, he attended what is now Arkansas Tech University in Russellville (Pope County), where he earned letters in both basketball and track before …

Bryant, “Bear”

aka: Paul William Bryant
Paul William “Bear” Bryant is one of America’s all-time most successful college football coaches. At the time of his death, he had won more games than any other coach, including the legendary Amos Alonzo Staggs and Pop Warner. Arkansas-born Bryant remains an icon not only for athletic accomplishments but for personal strength, determination, and the will to win. Paul William Bryant was born on September 11, 1913, near Kingsland (Cleveland County) in south-central Arkansas, to William Monroe Bryant, a farmer, and Dora Ida Kilgore Bryant, a homemaker. Bryant was the eighth surviving child (three died at birth) of a total of nine. He had four brothers and four sisters and was the youngest boy, with one sister born four years …

Bryant, John Winston

John Winston Bryant is an Arkansas politician and attorney who held an array of high-level offices in state government. Beginning as a legislative assistant on Capitol Hill in Washington DC and serving for two decades in statewide offices, Bryant was an influential figure in Arkansas politics over the last quarter of the twentieth century. Winston Bryant was born on October 3, 1938, in Malvern (Hot Spring County) to Johnie Bryant and Hestie Killian Bryant. He graduated from Ouachita Baptist University (OBU) in Arkadelphia (Clark County) in 1960. He then earned a law degree from the University of Arkansas School of Law in 1963, and he earned a Masters of Law in administrative law from George Washington University in 1970. Bryant …

Bryant, Kelly

Kelly Bryant was a Democratic politician in the 1960s and 1970s. He has long been identified as the first of three Hope (Hempstead County) natives who won statewide office from the 1960s to the 1990s, heading a trio that also included Bill Clinton and Mike Huckabee. Kelly Bryant, who grew up in Hope, was born in Shawnee, Oklahoma, on August 8, 1908, to Charles C. Bryant and Anna May Nelson Bryant. The family moved to Hope soon after Bryant’s birth. After finishing high school, Bryant attended the University of Arkansas (UA) in Fayetteville (Washington County), graduating in 1934 with a degree in business administration. Bryant spent the bulk of his professional life working in journalism and publishing before entering public …

Bryson (Lynching of)

A man known only as Bryson—apparently a white man—was lynched in early June 1888, presumably in Yell County. The details surrounding the incident are decidedly few, drawn primarily from an article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and reprinted in both the Arkansas Democrat and Arkansas Gazette. The original report, datelined June 11, 1888, from Dardanelle (Yell County), reads as follows: “Yesterday the body of one Bryson, riddled with bullets, was found a few miles below here in the Arkansas river. A few days ago Bryson attempted to criminally assault the wife of Dock Shinn, and was pursued by a posse. It is supposed he was overtaken, shot and his body flung into the river.” There is also a similar account …

Buchanan, Herbert Earle

Herbert Earle Buchanan was a nationally known astronomer, mathematician, teacher, and sports reformer. His research significantly advanced a mathematical understanding of the stability of the orbits of heavenly bodies, and he authored numerous college and university textbooks. Buchanan was very interested in athletics and was one of the founders of the National Collegiate Athletics Association. Buchanan was born in Cane Hill (Washington County) on October 4, 1881, to Susan Clark Williamson and James A. Buchanan, a Civil War veteran who became a farmer, surveyor, and circuit-riding Presbyterian minister. After attending the local “subscription school,” in which the family of each attending child paid a pro-rated fee, Buchanan entered the college preparatory program at Arkansas Industrial University (later the University of …

Buchanan, Roy

aka: Leroy Buchanan
Leroy (Roy) Buchanan was a guitar innovator whose skill inspired an aptly titled documentary, The Best Unknown Guitarist in the World. For more than thirty years, the guitarist melded blues, country, jazz, and rock music into a unique sound. Roy Buchanan was born September 23, 1939, in Ozark (Franklin County), the third of four children born to Bill Buchanan and Minnie Bell Reed Buchanan. When he was two, the family moved to Pixley, California, a tiny San Joaquin Valley farming town, where his father was a farm laborer. At age five, Buchanan learned a few guitar chords. When he was nine, his father bought him a red Rickenbacker lap steel guitar, and, by age twelve, he was playing lap steel …

Buford, Napoleon Bonaparte

Napoleon Bonaparte Buford served as a general officer in the Union army during the Civil War, including for several years as the commander of the District of Eastern Arkansas. Born in Woodford County, Kentucky, on January 13, 1807, to John and Nancy Buford, Napoleon Bonaparte Buford grew up in the state. His father was a member of the Kentucky legislature and later served in the Illinois legislature. In the 1830 federal census, his father was listed as owning forty-five slaves, evidence that the family was part of the landed elite in Kentucky. Buford graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1827. His class included Leonidas Polk, who became the first Episcopal bishop to serve Arkansas. After …

Bullfrog Valley Gang

The Bullfrog Valley Gang was a notorious counterfeiting ring that operated in the wilderness of Pope County during the depression of the 1890s. The gang’s origin and methods were mysterious, but the New York Times reported its demise on June 28, 1897. The article said deputy U.S. marshals attached to the federal district court at Fort Smith (Sebastian County) had captured three men, effectively breaking up “the once-famous band of counterfeiters known to secret service operators all over the United States as the Bullfrog Valley Gang.” Previous arrests were reported in Arkansas earlier in the year. In all, some fifteen men were arrested and convicted in federal courts at Fort Smith and Little Rock (Pulaski County). Others, in Arkansas and …

Bump, Dallas

Dallas Bump of Royal (Garland County) was a fourth-generation chair maker who constructed handcrafted furniture for more than seventy-five years. One of his handmade chairs, the “Bump Rocker,” spread his renown around the world. Along with being named an Arkansas Living Treasure by the Arkansas Arts Council in 2013, he saw his work featured in Southern Living magazine, spotlighted on television’s Good Morning America, and lauded by the Smithsonian Institution. One of his rockers found a home in the White House during the Bill Clinton administration. A Bump rocker is unique, as each step, from the fallen tree onward, was controlled by Dallas Bump and his family. The chairs are made one at a time and assembled with the family’s …

Bumpass, Rodger

Rodger Bumpass is an actor and voice performer who was born in Little Rock (Pulaski County) and attended Arkansas State University (ASU) in Jonesboro (Craighead County). Along with numerous television and film roles, he has achieved fame as the voice of the character Squidward in the popular SpongeBob SquarePants film and TV series. Rodger Bumpass was born on November 20, 1951, in Little Rock to Carroll C. Bumpass and Virginia Cathey Bumpass, owners of Bumpass Cleaners and Dyers in Little Rock. He had two siblings, Leonard and Cathey (the latter of whom died at birth), and attended Little Rock Central High School, where he obtained his first experience in theater, primarily in the area of comedy. In high school, he …