FINDING AID

AUBURN UNIVERSITY SPECIAL COLLECTIONS & ARCHIVES DEPARTMENT

Guide to the Rufus Spain Papers, RG 982

Listed by: Martin T. Olliff
Date: 10-4-94

Date Span: 1916-1989

Scope / Content: This is research material gathered by Dr. Spain, Professor of History at Baylor University, concerning Mr. J. C. Cameron, a farmer in western Alabama and a relative of Dr. Spain's. In addition to having gathered Cameron's journals, Spain has conducted numerous taped interviews of area residents and has analyzed the financial materials he has collected. This is the foundation of a book Dr. Spain tried to write, but his retirement has led him to relinquish this research to other potential scholars. See Joseph Columbus Cameron Papers, RG 969.

Biographical Sketch: Dr. Rufus Spain, Profesor Emeritus of History at Baylor University in Waco, Texas, began research a few years before his retirement for a narrative and quantitative analytical study of the J. C. Cameron family farm that strattled the Pickens - Lamar County line in western Alabama. Mr. Cameron held his farm from 1916 until 1953 and was a relative of Dr. Spain.

Dr. Spain collected a myriad of materials about the nature of farm work and farm life during those years, about the physical setting of the Cameron farm itself, but most particularly about the microeconomics of the Cameron family. This economic material consists of various copies of J. C. Cameron's farm account journals, including two computer diskettes in Macintosh Claris Filemaker Pro the information on which can be maipulated and recalled in numerous ways [see "Sample Printout," Box 2, FF 35]

SERIES 1: CAMERON LEDGERS

Box 1 [File numbers below]
1. Computer Printouts of Ledgers for 1925-1940
2. Computer Printouts of Ledgers for 1941-1950
3. Computer Printouts of Ledgers for 1951-1975
4. Cameron Ledgers - Microfilm

Box 2
1. Computer Diskettes re: Cameron Ledgers & Bibliography
35. Sample Printout from Computer Diskettes
36. Outline of Ledgers I - V [handwritten]
37. Typed Copy of Cameron Ledger I
38. Typed Copy of Cameron Ledger II, File 1 of 2
39. Typed Copy of Cameron Ledger II, File 2 of 2
40. Typed Copy of Cameron Ledger III, File 1 of 2
41. Typed Copy of Cameron Ledger III, File 2 of 2
42. Typed Copy of Cameron Ledger IV, File 1 of 2
43. Typed Copy of Cameron Ledger IV, File 2 of 2
44. Typed Copy of Cameron Ledger V, File 1 of 2
45. Typed Copy of Cameron Ledger V, File 2 of 2

Box 3
2. Photocopy of Cameron Ledger I
3. Photocopy of Cameron Ledger II
4. Photocopy of Cameron Ledger III
5. Photocopy of Cameron Ledger IV
6. Photocopy of Cameron Ledger V

SERIES 2:  AUDIOTAPED INTERVIEWS AND TRANSCRIPTS
Gray Box inside Box 1
  • File Cards of All Names Appearing in Ledgers
  • Eighteen Audio Cassette Tapes, Interviews:
    • Transcripts of Taped Interviews
    Box 2
    18. J. C. Cameron
    19. Annie Lou Cameron (Mrs. JC Cameron)
    20. Raymond Cameron
    21. Roy C. Cameron
    22. Troy Cameron
    23. Beale Cameron
    24. Bama Mills / Martha Widdle
    25. Mrs. Geneva Cook Abston
    26. Joe Golden
    27. Billy Prater
    28. Walter Baty
    29. Misses Ethel and Earline Thompson
    30. L. Howard Rowland
    31. Claude Coleman

    Untaped Interviews, Notes
    Box 2
    32. Mayo Atkins
    33. Joe Cook
    34. Marlon Miles

    SERIES 3: PHOTOGRAPHS AND MISCELLANEOUS DOCUMENTS re: CAMERON FARM
    Box 2
    2. Slides of Cameron Farmstead, w/ Index
    3. Photographs of Cameron Family Members & Tenants
    4. Records of Tenants and Farmhouses
    5. Cameron Farm Acreage Additions & Subtractions, 1916-1953
    6. Land Grants, Deeds, Etc.
    7. Microforms: Land Grants & Deeds
    8. Cameron Chronology
    9. Cameron Personal Documents, misc.
    10. Alabama Dept. of Agriculture and Industries, Agriculture in Alabama. Wetumpka, AL: Wetumpka Printing Co., 1938.
    11. Bibliography
    12. Cameron Land Use Materials
    13. Soil Survey - Lamar County, AL
    14. Soil Survey - Pickens County, AL

    Box 3
    1. Miscellaneous Maps, Cameron Farm

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