General Nathan Bedford Forrest
Sculpture by Jack Kershaw
A Gary Revel Arts and Entertainment News Web Site
Jack Kershaw on the right side, me on the left near one of Jack's works of art,
the life sized painting of his wife, Mary Noel-Kershaw
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Jack was born on October 12, 1913 in Missouri and grew up in Tennessee. He made a splash in the world in ways few would have expected. His mother and father were Karl and Ethel Norton Kershaw. His father had a degree in geology and civil mining. His mother was born in Wyoming and after her mother's death, her father abandoned his four children. Her uncle took the boys and raised them in Wyoming and Jack's mother and sister were sent to live with an aunt in Tennessee. She was raised in a home of privilege and received a good education, becoming a school teacher. She met and married Karl Kershaw in Missouri, and from this union Jack was born. Karl moved his family to Old Hickory, TN when WWI broke out, and was the engineer in charge of building the DuPont power plant. Mrs. Kershaw returned to the classroom to teach. Jack attended Warner school, MBA where he played football, and attended a military school at Stone Mountain, GA and then Vanderbilt University where he played football while majoring in geology, history and art. When the first pro football team was formed in Nashville in the late 1930's, he was the quarter back playing with such notable local characters as Haynes Noel. This team was dissolved due to the war. Jack was a member of the State of Tennessee Militia as a Calvary member. He was a member of the first Tennessee Arts Commission. His majors of geology, history and art were a
simple foundation on which he built a law degree and a law practice that would
eventually represent the accused assassin of Martin Luther King Jr., James Earl
Ray. This was during the 1970s and was the time he and I worked most closely together.
Primarily beginning as a group of students these 'Fugitive Poets' became a powerful addition to the
literary fabric of America.
They published ‘The Fugitive’, one of the most influential publications in the history of American letters. One of Jack’s
peers in the group, Robert Penn Warren-United States Poet Laureate and receiving the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for ‘All The King’s Men’. He went on to write over 50 other significant literary works and is the only person to have won Pulitzer Prizes for both fiction and poetry. Among his many achievements was the position
of Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to
the Library of Congress
Another of his Fugitive associates,
John Crowe Ransom not only was the founding force behind ‘The Fugitives’ but
also helped found the school of literary criticism, ‘New Criticism’. The 1941 volume of essays ‘The New Criticism’
began the American literary thought of criticism based on the text of
literature rather than extraneous information.
One of his works, a collection of essays first published in the Kenyon Review was subsequently published in 1972. He
served as a Senior Fellow of the Kenyon School of English and subsequently as a
Senior Fellow of the Indiana School of Letters.
The American poet, essayist and social commentator John
Orley Allen Tate was another friend and associate of Jack Kershaw and would also
become a Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress.
The poet/psychiatrist Merrill Moore was
also a peer of Jack Kershaw. Merrill the
poet was a prolific sonnet writer as well as a bit of an activist psychiatrist
during WWII. He had the distinction also
of being, for a short period of time, the medical doctor caring for Chiang
Kai-Shek, the Nationalist Chinese Supremo, and Generalissimo.
Donald Davidson, poet and historian,
was no less remarkable than any of the other friends and associates of Jack
Kershaw. He would not only write poetry
and prose but also write one of the most influential textbooks for English
courses in American colleges, American Composition and Rhetoric.
Laura Riding was one of the few ‘Fugitives’
not a peer or colleague from Vanderbilt.
She gained her status through her association with Allen Tate. Nonetheless her poetry, much of it free
verse, made its distinctive mark in the ‘The Fugitive’ publication.
The novelist, poet and journalist
William Ridley Wills was another ‘Fugitive’ that demands recognition for being
in that class of intellectuals along with Jack Kershaw. The novels ‘Hoax’ and ‘Harvey Landrum’stand
alongside his poetry and work as a journalist.
Another ‘Fugitive’ Cleanth Brooks
revolutionized the teaching of poetry in America with the publication of his ‘The
Well Wrought Urn: Studies in the Structure of Poetry’. Besides being most prominent in ‘New
Criticism’ he also was the driving force behind the structure and doctrine of ‘Formalist
Criticism - the interior life of a poem’. Among his other most influential textbooks
were: An Approach to Literature, Understanding Poetry, Understanding Fiction,
Modern Rhetoric and Understanding Drama.
American novelist, dramatist, essayist
and professor of literature Andrew Lytle was not only a friend and associate of
Jack Kershaw via ‘The Fugitives’ but he was also the first cousin of Jack’s
wife, Mary Noel. On a side note my daughter Mary was named Mary Noel Revel due
to the support and encouragement I received from Mary Noel-Kershaw during the
years I worked with her and Jack in the 1970s.
‘The Velvet Horn’ is considered one of Lytle’s best works but his
biography of General Nathan Bedford Forrest: ‘Bedford Forrest and His Critter
Company’ and his ‘A Wake for the Living’ was also important works of American
Literature.
There are other ‘Fugitives’ who most
certainly deserve recognition but this writing is more about the man and the
legend, Jack Kershaw. He was a leader as
shown by his role of quarterback in one of the first professional football
teams in our nation formed in Nashville Tennessee in the late 1930s. He later became a publisher and published the
book, ‘The Stringbean Murders’ about the killing of Stringbean (David Akeman)
and Stringbean’s wife Estelle. I knew Jack well and can assure you he was as much an artist as anything else, of course a sculptor as well and not only a lawyer and lecturer juxtapositionally built many homes in the extended Nashville Tennessee area. A complex man, being a farmer and was known in the intellectual circle as being a southern historian and lecturer. He graduated from Vanderbilt University in the early 1930's. I guess the one classification that is most appropriate for Jack is that he was truly a renaissance man, non conforming in style, dress and flourishing with magic to some extent as he persued his endeavors with relish and inspired focus and concentration. Jack was one of those unforgettable characters portrayed in the Readers Digest Articles. A gold plated eccentric. His most famous client was the late James Earl Ray. In his latter years he became a bit of a practical jokester, his antics in the court room by such 'co-conspirators' as the late Dave and J.W. Rutherford, Dan Garfincle, Sam Wallace and Judge Zuccarella are legendary. His most notable art piece is that of General Nathan Bedford Forrest Horse and Rider, located on I-65 South just north of Brentwood, and Joan of Arc, a two story statue depicting her death, burning at the stake. Jack was a co-founder of the League of the South; member of the (SCV) Sons of Confederate Veterans; M.O.S.B. the officer corps of the SCV; member Joe Johnston Camp 28 SCV. He was an heir of Admiral Kershaw CSA of South Carolina. During those latter years his close friends were Ryan and Terry Reeves of Old Hickory, Frank Ritter, Ross Massey, Wes Shofner, Henry Hood and Sir William Dorris. The only relatives I was aware of were two 2nd cousins, Mike Jamison of Los Angeles, CA and Debra Pronto of Indianapolis, IN. His works of art have received little attention but deserve to be recognized as the great
works of abstract and the surreal paintings, sculptures and statues that they are. His statues of General Nathan Bedford Forrest and Joan of Arc are absolutely stunning and giants in their
fields. He led the way in helping many
understand how the US Government had perpetrated a fraud on the American people
with the House Select Committee on Assassinations. As all insightful students of government
committees know now, the HSCA was not interested in investigating the
assassinations of JFK and MLK for the purpose of finding the real killers but
only for the purpose of continuing the cover-up of the actual crimes. Jack (John Karl "Jack" Kershaw) died on
September 7, 2010, though misunderstood by many, and I am one who really knew him
well and can tell you he was not only a Renaissance Man but a prince of a fellow and loved people regardless
of their race, creed or color.
My friend and associate Jack Kershaw is dead. I miss being able to pick up the phone and hear his voice on the other end. He tried to bring civility to our nation in many different ways and often was misunderstood in those attempts but alas, he helped me understand a great deal about patience and understanding, so in my case he succeeded. If you get a chance to see any of his paintings or sculptures take a minute to try to feel the spirit of the man that truly loved and shared his best with the world at large.
|Page 2|Page 3|Page 4|Page 5|Page 6Gary Revel found links to those responsible for the assassinations of JFK, MLK, RFK, John Lennon and the attempted killing of President Ronald Reagan.
A VERY INTERESTING PHONE CONVERSATIONOwner of Jongleur Music Group of companies that includes music publishing/production/distribution, movie development, and book publishing.
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