The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 94, July 1990 - April, 1991 Page: 156
692 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Southwestern Historical Quarterly
monthly dedicated to the notion that communism was a Jewish plot.
Smith grew increasingly anti-Semitic. He believed that the holocaust
never happened; those six million Hebrews had been smuggled into
the United States to keep Roosevelt (Smith thought his real name was
Rosenfelt) in power. Jesus, on the other hand, was a blue-eyed blond
born into a "Galilean," not a Jewish, family. Eventually everyone Smith
disliked-and the list grew longer-was to him either a Jew or possibly
a Jew who had changed his name.
During the 196os this "elder statesman of the far right," as Jean-
sonne calls him, saw to the construction of a gigantic Christ of the Ozarks,
a seventy-foot-high statue atop a mountain in Eureka Springs, Arkan-
sas, along with an amphitheater for an outdoor pageant depiction of
the life and death of Christ. Smith died in 1976, but his Christ of the
Ozarks and the Passion Play still draw large crowds. The Christ statue,
however, has begun to develop cracks at the base.
Jeansonne's biography of Smith has been nominated by the publisher
for the Pulitzer Prize in biography and the Bancroft prize. Gerald L. K.
Smith is at once a scholarly, entertaining, yet troubling study of a dis-
turbed man who for a time commanded a sizable following. During
Smith's last years, Jeansonne gained access to Smith and his personal
files. The fiery old man suspected his biographer would not be compli-
mentary, and Jeansonne never deceived him. Nonetheless Smith was
willing to talk at length because his egocentric nature compelled it. To
him, a critical biography was better than none at all. Above all else,
Smith hoped to avoid oblivion. Thanks to Jeansonne's superb book,
Gerald L. K. Smith will not be forgotten.
Georgia College WILLIAM I. HAIR
Bounty Hunter. By Rick Miller. (College Station, Tex.: Early West Crea-
tive Publishing Co., 1988. Pp. 255. Introduction, preface, illustra-
tions, notes, epilogue, bibliography, and index. $21.95.)
Garrett and Roosevelt. By Jack DeMattos. (College Station, Tex.: Early
West Creative Publishing Co., 1988. Pp. 18o. Introduction, ac-
knowledgments, illustrations, notes, epilogue, sources, and index.
$18.95.)
Reviewing two books in one sitting is sometimes a difficult task-but
not this time. These works are, together, not worth the effort. Garrett
and Roosevelt is a very short monograph with meager research and poor
writing. In fact, artist-writer Jack DeMattos, who is a consultant for Real
West magazine, appears to have strung together clippings from the El
Paso Herald, along with letters from the National Archives, into a bor-156
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 94, July 1990 - April, 1991, periodical, 1991; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101214/m1/180/?rotate=270: accessed April 19, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.