Arthur Frommer: “I Hated the Jingoism”
Travel Blog • Jim Benning • 08.10.05 | 10:06 AM ET
Guidebook author Arthur Frommer is featured in a short profile in The Seattle Times. The piece covers some interesting ground, including Frommer’s non travel-related books (among them, “The Bible and the Public Schools,” in which he argued against compulsory Bible reading in schools), and his unorthodox guidebook to Branson, Missouri. “It’s the only guidebook in history,” he said, “that tells the reader, in effect, do not go!”
Frommer, who grew up in Missouri, didn’t much care for town. “I hated the jingoism,” he said. “I hated these country singers, who had all been draft dodgers themselves during Vietnam, who marched down the aisle with drum beats, with machine-gun bullets, and waved the flag. Also, all of these people who become so religious! ... Many of the country-music theaters in Branson are used as stages for proselytizing.”
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Jim Benning is the editor and co-founder of World Hum.
Jerry Haines 08.11.05 | 11:39 AM ET
Thanks for the link. Would that the profile were longer. I think one of the best things in A Sense of Place is Michael Shapiro’s interview with Frommer, particularly his reminiscences of post-WW II Europe and writing travel tips for his fellow GI’s.
Jim Benning 08.11.05 | 11:46 AM ET
I agree, Jerry. That interview Michael did was terrific. I learned a lot about Frommer I didn’t know.
Michael Shapiro 08.15.05 | 2:31 PM ET
Thanks for your kudos about my interview with Arthur Frommer in A Sense of Place. I had to make a case to get Frommer into the book because my editors saw A Sense of Place as a collection of interview with literary travel writers, not guidebook writers. But Frommer is a literary writer in his way, and lots of people say that my interview with him is one of the highlights of the book.
Most of all I’m impressed with Arthur’s ethics - just one example: in the ‘90s he had a radio show at a NYC station that hired a hateful talkshow host, not just ultra-rightwing but so racist he chortled with delight when Ron Brown died in a plane crash. Arthur said he wouldn’t work at a station if this man stayed so he quit he highly rated radio show.
Interestingly, lots of people really enjoyed my interview with Rick Steves, the other guidebook writer in the book.