New South leaders, crusaded timelessly for the industrial order of his day in order for Southerners to never forget their past. In an emotional speech he said, ‘to hold in tenderest reverence the memory of the Southern land: never forget to give all honour to the men and women of ante-bellum days; remember… that the Old South produced a race of men and women whose virtues… are worthy to be enshrine… in every American heart’ 242 Edmunds words suggest that this need for memory to maintain the Southern myth is to remember the Southern virtues and way of life to help maintain it for sentimental values. On the contrary William R. Taylor, a professor of Harvard argues that the ‘underlying point is that the desperate, furious myth-making of the period 1820-1860 was the product of a social order increasingly aware of its failure to grow and mature, and increasingly fearful that "Yankees" would exploit that failure’. 243 This varied debate on the reason for this appearance of memory is still widely discussed between historians now, however it is clear that either side of the debate has strengths to its argument. But with the myth of the Old South still prevalent in Southern mentality today, it seems that for either reason, the use of memory in creating and establishing the myth was an intrinsic part of the keeping the Old South alive. Another way the Old South has kept its virtuous and wholesome image is through the use of media and culture. Re- telling of the South’s story in books and films, whilst seen 242 Gaston, p.23. 243 Michael W. Schwartz, The Myth of the Old South , The Harvard Crimson, (September 1962) <http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1962/9/29/the-myth-of-the-old- south/> [date of access 04/05/15]
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