The author of a new
book on the impact of Wal-Mart on Bentonville claims she had offers for
two appearances at libraries in Northwest Arkansas rescinded after
library trustees expressed concern over how the book portrays Wal-Mart.

Marjorie Rosen is the author of the new
book “Boom Town: How Wal-Mart Transformed an All-American Town into an
International Community,” recently published by Chicago Review Press.
The book features interviews with Bentonville residents who have seen
their lives touched by the rise of Sam Walton’s mega-corporation,
including a black man who revolutionized the company’s human resources
department, a Muslim contractor who built the city’s first synagogue, a
Latino family that migrated to the area, and a trucker whose fortunes
rose with the coming of industrial chicken production. 

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Rosen said that after reading the book,
librarians at both the Bentonville Public Library and the Rogers Public
Library were excited about the prospect of having her come to speak. A
librarian at the Bentonville Public Library suggested “Boom Town” might
be a candidate for the month when everyone in the area reads the same
book. In Rogers, negotiations for her appearance got far enough along
that librarians made plans to pick her up at the airport. 

Then, unexpectedly, both appearances
were called off. When she pressed library officials as to why, Rosen
said, she was told that trustees of the libraries had expressed
concerns about how it would play at Wal-Mart.

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“[The Bentonville librarian] said, the
trustee thought your book was quote-unquote ‘inflammatory,’ and
everything is off,” Rosen remembers. “I said that’s a very serious
charge to make an academic.”  Even after Rosen offered to appear for
free, to allow the library to pick the passage she would read, and to
offer a chance for the public to ask her questions or challenge her
about the content of the book after the reading, Bentonville library
officials still refused.

Rosen said a similar thing happened in
Rogers. Rosen said her contact there told her they were planning a big
reception and a reading. The afternoon Rosen made her flight
reservations, however, the librarian called back “panicked,” saying the
trustees of the library had read her book.

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“She was like a different person, like
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” Rosen said. “It was like, ‘I’m sorry, but we
have to cancel your lecture, we don’t have enough money in the budget.’
I said, ‘I’ll do it for free. Don’t worry about it.’ ‘[The library
official said] No, no, no. We can’t. There’s some political situation.’

Rosen has since approached the
Bentonville Chamber of Commerce about hosting a reading of the book
when she comes to Northwest Arkansas the first week of November, but
hasn’t heard anything from them at this writing. There are currently no
readings scheduled in Bentonville. A reading at the Fayetteville Public
Library on the evening of Nov. 3 and some appearances before college
classes there are the only readings she has scheduled in Northwest
Arkansas so far. 

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Judy Casey, director of the Rogers
Public Library, said that the cancellation of Rosen’s appearance there
had nothing to do with Wal-Mart. She said that she had “tentatively
confirmed” Rosen’s reading at the library, but called back to cancel
later the same day after speaking with trustees. The library was
hosting a reading by the novelist James Patterson in October, Casey
said, and it was decided that they shouldn’t hold two author events so
close together. Casey said that the “political situation” she mentioned
to Rosen was in reference to local issues, not Wal-Mart. “We decided we
were in budget hearings, things were being scrutinized about what we
were doing and who we were having come in.” she said. “It had nothing
to do with Wal-Mart. It was just some dynamics of where we were at
right now with our library.”  

Hattie Dudley, the director of the
Bentonville Public Library, disputed the claim that Wal-Mart had
anything to do with the cancellation of Rosen’s reading there. Though
Dudley said there is one Wal-Mart employee on the library board, she
said the board knew nothing about the effort to schedule a reading for
Rosen’s book. She  said the decision to not host a reading by Rosen was
hers alone, and that the librarian who had spoken to Rosen about an
appearance didn’t have the authority to make programming decisions. 

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“This person wasn’t involved in doing
the programs for adults,” Dudley said. “That was kind of an informal
chat with her about, this might be a good thing. Then, whenever we
looked at our programming slate and our budget, we thought it wouldn’t
be something the library wanted to participate in.”

For her part, Rosen disputes the idea
that the book is inflammatory. She said she believes it holds
Bentonville up as a template for small town America when it comes to
multicultural issues.

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“I do talk about some vendors who went
bankrupt as a result of Wal-Mart,” Rosen said. “But in general, it’s a
very positive book about Wal-Mart; what a good neighbor it is, and how
Wal-Mart has created this comfortable, wealthy town that people want to
stay in now.”

Rosen said she has no reason to suspect
that Wal-Mart was directly involved in the cancellations of her
readings, saying it was more likely the work of those who were “scared
or protective” of the company. The experience has made her rethink what
she had believed about Bentonville. 

“It makes me think I was an easy mark,
actually — that I didn’t actually understand something about the long
arm of Wal-Mart,” Rosen said. “These are libraries. They’re supposed to
be dealing with free speech, free expression, free thought and fact.” 

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