Actors - Cimarron

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	Actors - Cimarron

Cimarron is the title of a novel published by popular historical fiction author Edna Ferber in 1929. The book was adapted into a critically acclaimed film in 1931 through RKO Pictures. In 1960, the story was again adapted for the screen to meager success by MGM. Both the novel and 1931 film have fallen out of favor due to perceived racism.

Background

The Author

Born on August 15, 1885, in Michigan, Ferber had lived through the latter development of the West.
She also grew up on the stories of her parents and grandparents, who had moved west from New York many years before her birth. Her writing career began as a journalist, and Ferber published her first novel in 1911. Ferber's early works were mostly light romance. It was not until 1924's So Big that Ferber's career as a novelist came to fruition. That novel, about love and sacrifice in the "old" West, earned Ferber a Pulitzer Prize. She then immersed herself in historical epics, following So Big first with Show Boat
, based on and around the Mississippi River, and then with Cimarron in 1929.

The Land Rush

The Oklahoma Land Rush (also called the Oklahoma Land Race and Cherokee Strip Land Run) plays a pivotal role in both the novel and film adaptations. "Manifest destiny" and the desperation of the settlers involved in the rush provides the opening drama and sets the stage for the twists and turns in the book. Every settler is desperate to stake his claim on the best piece of land (near water).

The actual land rush occurred on September 16, 1893. The piece of land in question had been allotted to the Cherokee people as part of their 1828 treaty, while the rest of the Oklahoma Territory had been open to settlers. As commerce grew across the area of Kansas and Oklahoma, cattlemen became increasingly annoyed by the presence of the Cherokee on prime land that they wanted to use to drive cattle from northern ranches to Texas. In the 1880s, the government attempted to lease the land to cattle farming, but the Native Americans refused. Eventually, the Cherokee people did sell the land to the government and were forced into cramped reservations scattered across Arizona, New Mexico, and southwestern Texas.

Throughout the remaining years of the 1880s various cattle associations and ranches fought over the land. Disputes even turned deadly, as large cattle companies and small ranchers both claimed the land as their own. This eventually led to a ban on cattle farming in the area, and in 1893 the land, 58 miles (93 km) wide by 225 miles (362 km) long, was opened to homesteaders. The land was divided into 42,000 claims, and each homesteader had to literally stake (put a stake with a white flag attached) their claim, and pick up a certificate back at the starting place. Nearly 100,000 people arrived for the rush, and over half of them would be sent back home after the day was through.

The Novel

Cimarron derives its name from the Cimarron Territory. The Cimarron Territory was an unrecognized name for "No Man's Land," unsettled areas of the West and Midwest, especially lands once inhabited by Native American tribes such as the Cherokee and Sioux. In 1886 the government declared such lands open to settlement. Oklahoma at the time of the novel's opening is one such "Cimarron Territory."

The novel is set in the Oklahoma of the latter nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It follows the lives of Yancy and Sabra Cravat, as they emigrate from the east to Oklahoma. While there they befriend the Rickeys, a Jewish printing family setting up a newspaper, and Yancy decides to work for Mr. Rickey. In 1893 the Peglers and the Cravats, and numerous other settlers, try their luck in the 1893 land rush. Eventually the Cravats take over the newspaper and build their fortune amongst Indian disputes, outlaws, and the discovery of oil in Oklahoma.

Upon its publication, Cimarron was a sensation in America and came to epitomize an era in American history. This novel became Ferber's third successful novel and paved the way for many more historical epics penned by the author.

Films

1931 film

Hollywood had long since taken notice of writer Edna Ferber's talents. The first Ferber adaptation came in 1918 with the silent Our Mrs. McChesney, based on a play Ferber had written. So Big was released as a film the very year it was published as a novel, and adaptations of Gigolo and Showboat also followed. With the advent of sound, Ferber adaptations had even more promise. Immediately following its publication, many production companies courted Ferber. Ferber ended up selling the film rights to RKO Pictures in 1930 for a record $125,000 (a large sum even for today).

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