Dr. Faulkner holds an M.A. in History from East Carolina University and a Ph.D. in History from the University of South Carolina. He authored Jesse Helms and the Legacy of Nathaniel Macon (Wingate, 1998). He has also written entries for the Dictionary of North Carolina Biography (Chapel Hill, 1994-1996) and the Encyclopedia of North Carolina (Chapel Hill, 2006), and he has contributed to journals such as the North Carolina Historical Review, Tennessee Historical Quarterly, and The Historian. In 2017 he retired from Winthrop University.
Hinton Rowan Helper (1829–1909)
Abolitionist, diplomat, and lecturer, Hinton Rowan Helper was born December 27, 1829, near Mocksville, North Carolina. In 1857 he published The Impending Crisis of the South: How to Meet It. This book ranked second only to Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin in its influence for abolition. Although a racist, Helper profoundly influenced American politics and doubtless hastened the demise of “the peculiar institution."
Furnifold McLendel Simmons (1854-1940)
A Democratic Congressman and U.S. Senator, Furnifold M. Simmons was born on January 20, 1854 to Furnifold Green, Jr., and Mary McLendel Jerman Simmons of Jones County, North Carolina. A leader in the "white supremacy" movement during the late 1890s, Simmons played an instrumental role in the disfranchisement of African Americans in North Carolina and served thirty years in the U.S. Senate, where his most notable achievements were obtaining funds for the Intercoastal Waterway and ensuring lower tariff rates and the passage of the Underwood-Simmons Tariff.
Fusion Politics
During the 1890s, a national phenomenon called Fusion politics united political parties. In some western states the Populist (or People’s Party) and the Democratic Party united, but in North Carolina the movement, spearheaded by agricultural leader Marion Butler (1863-1938), combined the Populist and Republican parties. In the presidential election of 1896, the Populist Party found itself ironically backing the Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan (1860-1925) at the national level, while joining forces with Republicans at the state level.