First published in 1949, Frank L. Owlsey's _Plain Folk of the Old South_ was the first book to systematically lay to rest the myth of the antebellum South's division into three classes--planters, poor whites, and slaves. Owsley draws on a wide range of source materials--firsthand accounts such as diaries and the published observations of travelers and journalists, church records, and county records including wills, deeds, tax lists, and grand-jury...