The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 84, July 1980 - April, 1981 Page: 464

Southwestern Historical Quarterly

thors note "An important stimulus in the formation of what William
H. Jordy has called the 'regional vision' " (p. 40).
However, a contemporaneous viewpoint on the merit of Staub's
work is represented by quotations by James Chillman, Jr., former Rice
University professor. According to this scholar, Staub's work "is eclectic
only in that it recognizes in certain forms of the past complete appro-
priateness to modern living" (p. xi).
Perhaps one of the finest encomiums was related by Anderson Todd,
professor of architecture at Rice University, when he informed the
authors on the reason underlying the selection of Staub as an associate
for the addition to the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston. Ludwig Mies
van der Rohe, architect for the addition, praised Staub for "his sense
of material, his generous spaces, and his eclecticism" (p. ix, 65 n.).
The photography in this book is splendid. The color folio brings out
the excellence of the polychromy of materials. The descriptive folio
includes numerous plans, and the architecture of the houses is en-
hanced by good camera angles and the play of light, shades, and shad-
ows on the forms, important aspects of design.
Texas Tech University WILLARD B. ROBINSON
Redneck Mothers, Good Ol' Girls and Other Southern Belles: A Cele-
bration of the Women of Dixie. By Sharon McKern. (New York:
Viking Press, 1979. Pp. xx+268. Prologue, epilogue. $10.95.)
The glorification of the southern woman continues unabated; if any-
thing, it has intensified in recent years. In Redneck Mothers, Good
Ol' Girls and Other Southern Belles Sharon McKern offers reasons for
that phenomenon and a character study of the southern woman of
today. Sift through the descriptions of women in this study, ranging
from Miz Lillian, Loretta Lynn, Janis Joplin, Kitty Welles, Lady Bird
Johnson, and Betty Talmadge, to New Orleans hooker "Sally Ann
Ferguson," and a host of others, and you emerge with a picture of a
southern woman which author Sharon McKern defends as unique.
The premise is debatable, but the book is delightful, provided you
don't mind heavy doses of both female and southern chauvinism.
McKern's southern woman, who has been "shaped far more by his-
torical influences than have [her] male counterparts" (p. 6), gains free-
dom and strength from compromise and creative eccentricity. She is a
survivor, above all else, who grants a surface obeisance to the man or
men in her life, while trading public power for private power. This

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