Being both a crazy and a dorky guy, one year during college I decided to spend a Spring Break exploring the South, with another crazy and dorky guy. Specifically, our plan was to see as much of the Mississippi River as would fit into our week-long Spring Break.

After a bit of research, it turned out that this was pretty easy to do. The Great River Road follows Ol’ Man River for most of his length (by the way, I highly recommend driving the Great River Road; it’s a cool historical route). Anyway, by making a giant box to get there (see below), the two of us eventually made our way from Memphis, TN to New Orleans, LA, sleeping in a conversion van parked in various state and local parks.

Our Route

Now, the stories I could tell from this experience could fill a number of posts. We ate at diners in Tennessee, saw Civil War sites in Vicksburg, and surprised Lawrence’s family with a delivery of crawfish from Biloxi, MS. Frankly though, some of these stories are too inappropriate to tell publicly – for instance, let me just say that after a night in New Orleans, I woke up inexplicably at a truck stop in Mississippi – with no wallet – after laying all night on top of two umbrellas on the floor of my van. However, certainly the craziest highlight of this trip took place in Greenville, MS.

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While my main field of historical research is Modern U.S. history, my secondary field is women’s history. I don’t really know how that happened, but my research topics for the past few years have dealt heavily with women’s issues, and so I responded by entering that field.

Anyway, I’ve been compelled since then to investigate gender issues in a more analytical light. One of the events that I think about from time to time, and one of my better southern stories, is what happened at the promenades I attended in high school.
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When I was in high school, I was already trying to apply my sociological imagination for my own benefit. By my senior year, I was very aware of the role football played in status and, thus, the role football played in one’s dating outlook. As an effort to gain the good graces of the cheerleaders at Suwannee High School and to gain attention more broadly, I spoke to the Suwannee County School Board in 2001 in protest of the decision to not allow the already-purchased cheerleading uniforms to be worn at school.

In one my earliest (and most failed) attempts at eloquence, I spoke to a crowded room of maybe 70 people about my own initial doubts concerning the importance or function of cheerleaders, and then discussed my stark conversion once the cheerleader uniform ban was revealed. The image of a school lacking such prominent reminders of this core tradition of southern education and tradition, football culture, was a devolution of our community feelings, I argued, and the long tradition of cheerleading uniforms allowing bare shoulders and slightly shorter skirts (which is required by the full range of motion in their routines) was an important mechanism for bringing school spirit to mind throughout the school day and not just at games that only a (sizable) minority attended. I also argued that I routinely broke dress code through my involvement in school theatre and playing varsity soccer (that’s right, varsity), as well as for Halloween and other costume events, all without recrimination. The Suwannee Democrat quotes me in their coverage of this debacle as saying, in reference to cheerleading uniforms during the school day, “It’s a symbol of our school, a tradition.”

While the uniform ban was not reversed, there was an up side: we had at least made the attempt, we had stood up and had been heard. Cheerleaders, parents, and I learned about the organizing for issues we believe in, and these skills are important for being good citizens.

And I did succeed in going on a series of dates with a cheerleader.