16 Facts About Sam Faubus

John Samuel Faubus was an American small farmer and founder of one of Arkansas' few chapters of the Socialist Party of America.

Sam Faubus was the father of Governor of Arkansas Orval E Faubus.

Sam Faubus was born in Madison County on Mill Creek south of Combs in the Ozark Mountains, Arkansas, to William Henry Faubus and Malinda Faubus, who had seven children.

Sam Faubus's father died in the winter of 1900 from pneumonia shortly after relocating to Greasy Creek, north of Combs, and the widow married John Nelson; she gave birth to another eight children.

Altogether, John Samuel Faubus had fifteen siblings and stepsiblings and was referred to as Sam.

Sam Faubus received little education, and when he was seventeen, he went to work as a journeyman hacker, hewing railroad crossties.

However, Sam developed a habit of reading books and became self-educated; later, he became a regular correspondent to local newspapers.

Sam Faubus gave his oldest son Orval the middle name Eugene to honor the Socialist Party of America founder, Eugene V Debs; another son, Darrow Doyle, was named after well known the time labor lawyer Clarence Darrow; and a third son, Elvin Carl, received a middle name after Karl Marx.

The Faubuses were subsistence farmers and toiled on their homesteaded thin-soiled upland farm in the Ozark Mountain country to provide their children with food and basic necessities; Sam did menial work to earn money while Addie looked after children.

Sam Faubus constantly searched for better paying jobs; he did itinerant agricultural work in the Midwest and Canada, and worked in a lead mine at Picher, Oklahoma, for two years.

Under the influence of his older and more political savvy neighbor, O T Green, Sam joined the Socialist Party of America.

Sam Faubus was a firm opponent of the US involvement in World War I and once was arrested with Arch Cornett for distributing anti-war literature and charged with the Sedition Act of 1918 violation.

Sam Faubus advocated introduction of the graduated income tax, old age benefits, supported racial equality, repeal of restricting voting poll tax, and women's suffrage, along with other socialists in Arkansas.

Sam Faubus disapproved of Orval's actions during the integration crisis and privately conveyed his position to him.

At that time, Sam Faubus already changed his political standing, becoming a Franklin Roosevelt New Deal Democrat.

John Samuel Faubus died from lymphatic cancer on August 24,1966.