SOUTHWESTERN HISTORICAL QUARTERLY最新文献

• Cabeza de Vaca and the Moon
• Donald W. Olson (bio)

This depiction, titled Cabeca de Vaca in the Desert, appeared in the October 14, 1905, issue of Collier’s magazine as the first of ten illustrations by Erederic Remington in a series called “The Great Explorers.”

The sixteenth-century odyssey of Álvar Núũez Cabeza de Vaca and his fellow survivors from the Pánfilo de Narváez expedition has been the subject of books, scholarly analysis, and various translations of the original Spanish accounts throughout the centuries since the events took place. The expedition, originally planned as an exploration to discover new world resources for Spain, instead resulted in Cabeza de Vaca’s capture and lengthy stay among groups of indigenous people. His story is enthralling as well as a unique source of ethnological and anthropological information. Cabeza de Vaca’s Relación, the narrative of his experiences, appeared first in 1542 and then, in a subsequent edition with slight changes, in 1555.¹ Based on clues in the text that allow a variety of interpretations, scholars have disputed both the route followed by Cabeza de Vaca and the dates of the events between his shipwreck and his journey’s end in Mexico City. In a passage often studied for its chronological implications, he described the phases of the Moon, with specific mentions of the month and day but without giving the year. The purpose of this note is to use astronomy to offer a new explanation for this lunar passage and to identify the year which matches this description.

In April 1528, five ships under the command of Narváez reached the west coast of Florida. Disasters followed, with the three hundred members of a land expedition becoming permanently separated from the support ships and eventually forced to slaughter their horses for food. The Spaniards constructed improvised rafts to leave Florida by sea and planned to travel along the Gulf [End Page 375]

The makeshift raft carrying Cabeza de Vaca and other Spaniards was cast ashore on the Texas coast in November 1528. This illustration of the scene appeared in Elbridge Gerry Littlejohn’s Cabeza de Vaca and La Salle, Volume 1 of the Texas History Stories series (Richmond, Virginia: B. F. Johnson Publishing Company, 1901).

[End Page 376]

Coast to reach Spanish settlements in Mexico at the Río Pánuco, which they mistakenly believed was nearby. After a voyage that became increasingly difficult, five rafts landed

• Marketing Higher Education in Texas: Trinity University as a Case Study
• R. Douglas Brackenridge (bio) and J. Charlene Davis (bio)

Widely used photograph in 1950s and 1960’s promoting Trinity’s new campus in San Antonio. Courtesy Trinity University Archives, San Antonio, Texas.

Texas colleges and universities have competed by promoting themselves in different geographical, cultural, economic, pedagogical, and technological contexts over the past 150 years. Focusing on such efforts by Trinity University and placing them in the wider contexts of peer institutions and national marketing trends provides a great case study. Having had four campuses in three different locations, from a village (Tehuacana,1869–1902) to a county seat (Waxahachie, 1902–1942) and then a large city (San Antonio 1942–present), Trinity provides striking examples of how Texas educational institutions sought to maintain institutional integrity while responding to changing external pressures and priorities.¹

Recent articles suggest the marketing of universities is a relatively new phenomenon, especially in terms of intention and use of consumer marketing tactics to provide messages about the product.² But is this a twenty-first century phenomenonffi Research presented here indicates that long before terms such as branding, students as customers, marketing, target audiences, competitive advantage, and positioning became commonplace, educational institutions have been engaged in ‘selling their product’ in a competitive environment. This study provides a unique perspective on the practice of marketing higher education in Texas. Despite the state’s size, isolation, and strong sense of independence, [End Page 423] Texas institutions of higher learning are no different than those of other states. All faced similar pressures of enrollment, fundraising, and relevancy. Analyzing primary source materials, this research exams the phenomenon across time and across disciplines with the dual perspectives of history and marketing being brought to bear. Such an interdisciplinary approach may be unique, and it has certainly proved useful.

Frequently, writers express concern and dismay that the application of marketing terminology to higher education reduces it to a market commodity that may not align with the ideals and purpose of an academy. What is marketing and what might make it objectionable to those involved in higher education? Marketing involves a variety of activities designed to make products appeal to consumers by providing unique features, advertising messages, availability, and a price point that supports the organization while satisfying marketplace wants and n

Reviewed by:

• Son of Vengeance: Searching for the Legendary Apache Rafaelby Bradley Folsom
• James Bailey Blackshear

Many scholars have offered explanations as to why Mexico lost Texas in 1836, but few have provided the story with the level of detail Bradley Folsom provides in Son of Vengeance. What it so interesting about this accomplishment is that it is a by-product, not the focus, of the book. Instead, this work is about a serial killer who rampages across northern New Spain in the first decade of the nineteenth century, the manhunt that ensues, and what impact this killer’s depredations had on the isolated communities he preyed upon. And more than that, it is also a scholar’s hunt through long forgotten archives for the perpetrator, a mysterious figure known as El Indio Rafael. The subject was a master of disguises, prolific plunderer, and slippery fugitive, but Folsom chases him down, and at the same time exposes what it meant to live in the midst of the Spanish colonial frontier.

In ten detailed chapters, the author populates northern New Spain with the Spanish, mestizo, criollo, and Apache residents who called it home. He also details the reign of terror a Hispanicized Apache perpetrated upon all of them: shepherds, ranchers, mail carriers, soldiers, priests, muleteers, and various groups of indigenous peoples who crossed his path from 1804 to 1810. Folsom ensures Rafael’s victims are not stick figures. Reconstructing hundreds of crime scenes across Nueva Vizcaya and other provinces, he provides names, as well as the descriptions of the innumerable villages, rivers, mountains, and canyons where they lived. Engagements with militia and regular army are also covered. Six excellent maps allow the reader to follow the chase through parts of Mexico with which they may not be familiar.

Using primary and secondary source documents, the most important being a report on Rafael generated for Commandant General Nemesio Salcedo of the Internal Provinces, Folsom provides a granular level of detail seldom found in early nineteenth-century histories of this region. In the telling, he explores the tenuous relationships that existed between everyone who lived within this cultural shatter-zone, as well as what a dangerous place the frontier could be for people scratching out an existence in isolated communities far from the centers of power. El Indio Rafael was an equal opportunity predator, waylaying Spanish soldiers, indigenous militias, peasants, Tarahumara and Tepehuan Indians, and anyone else who could provide him with the goods needed to

Reviewed by:

• Hispano Bastion: New Mexican Power in the Age of Manifest Destiny, 1837–1860by Michael J. Alarid
• William S. Kiser

Hispano Bastionoffers an interesting analysis of New Mexico’s era of American territorialization. Michael J. Alarid argues that “large landholding Hispanos maintained a great deal of political, economic, and social authority in the age of Manifest Destiny . . . [and] embraced American capitalism” (p. 3). The most original contribution involves statistical and narrative coverage of crime—using theories of homicide as one lens of analysis—and the book’s dozens of tables and graphs are enlightening. Five chapters examine patrón-vecinorelationships, larceny and homicide, and criminal punishment under the United States legal system, with a primary focus on Santa Fe County.

The book revolves around an overly simplistic dichotomy of patrónand vecinoas the two social and economic classes outside of American newcomers. Indigenous peoples receive little consideration, and Alarid defines vecinosas “the poor and working populations of New Mexico” (p. 3). Based on this proposed dichotomy and definition, New Mexico’s thousands of debtor servants, or peones, must fall within Alarid’s category of vecinos. But this important dynamic of the patrónsystem in New Mexico—especially as it relates to national debates about slavery and unfree labor during the antebellum era—receives no attention in this book. Debt peonage as a form of unfree labor in the Hispanic Southwest has received considerable scholarly attention over the past decade, but Alarid does not engage with that literature, nor does he even cite recent work on the topic. The terms peonand debt servitude do not appear in the index, and there are just three uses of these words (pp. 18, 56, 153). In places, romanticized terminology distorts the harsh realities of unfree labor in New Mexico. For example, Alarid uses “day laborers” (pp. 16, 18), “working-class vecinos” (p. 13), and “symbiotic—if unequal—coexistence” (pp. 6, 13, 109) to describe a broad category that includes debtor servants, who certainly did not fall into such innocuous groupings and whose bound relationships to masters were often far from “symbiotic.” The author’s brief discussion of antebellum New Mexico slave codes (pp. 140–142) also fails to acknowledge the local contexts of Hispano peonage and Indian captivity, again creating an incomplete portrayal of New Mexico and the Southwest in relation to n

Reviewed by:

• More Than Running Cattle: The Mallet Ranch of the South Plainsby M. Scott Sosebee
• Michael M. Miller

This glossy, photograph-laden profile tells the story of the Mallet Ranch on Texas’s South Plains. Primarily focused on the lives of founder David DeVitt’s philanthropic daughters, Christine and Helen, the narrative highlights the uniqueness of an operation founded in the late-nineteenth century that successfully continues to operate today largely as it began. In More Than Running Cattle, historian M. Scott Sosebee continues to feature lesser-known contributors to Texas history. He pens here a synthesis and update of David Murrah’s 1994 monograph, Oil, Taxes, and Cats, wrapping it into a package underscoring the contributions the Mallet Land and Cattle Company continues to provide to the region. ¹

A casual glance at this oversized book on a shelf or in a catalog does not reveal the complex, sometimes distressing story told among the historical prints, institution-provided marketing shots, and mostly uncaptioned photographs provided by Wyman Meinzer. His grassland vistas of the ranch’s acres dotted with Angus cattle, oil field pumpjacks, and decaying buildings seem detached from Sosebee’s narrative. Only the few historical photographs and family [End Page 476]snapshots fit closely within the chronicle. Others feature the projects the DeVitt sisters’ largesse brought to Lubbock and other parts of the South Plains through their CH Foundation and The Helen Jones Foundation, Inc.

Despite the book’s ”coffee table” feel, Sosebee’s account proves captivating and “has everything television or movie producers and directors might want” (p. 221). The story often takes on a gossipy, soap-opera feel in describing and dissecting the often-dysfunctional family and company dynamics that unfolded over a century. There is the long-distance relationship that David and Florence DeVitt carried on throughout most of their marriage, the tragic deaths of the couple’s two sons, Christine’s indecision and obstinance, and there is Helen’s colon. Readers may find much to dislike about the DeVitt family, but they will see much to admire, too, not the least of which are the gifts for which they are responsible. While acknowledging Christine’s sometimes abrasive personality, at her death many remembered her quiet help and generosity to Mallet hands and to nurses and others who looked after her in later years. At this book’s core is a celebration of “one of

Reviewed by:

• You Will Never Be One of Us: A Teacher, A Texas Town, and the Rural Roots of Radical Conservatismby Timothy Paul Bowman
• James B. Barrera

The culture wars of the 1960s and ‘70s led to social, cultural, and political divisions between liberals and conservatives throughout the United States. Timothy Bowman’s You Will Never Be One of Usoffers a microcosm of this type of “war” in the small, rural community of Hereford, situated in the Texas Panhandle. In particular, the book focuses on how the local conservative elite, including various school administrators and community members, opposed renewing the teaching contract of local English teacher Wayne Woodward when he started a local chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). This story also provides great insight into the circumstances and conditions that led to Woodward’s dismissal and his civil rights case to contest the non-renewal of his contract in 1975.

The book begins with a historiographical analysis of rural conservatism, including its origins and development in the Texas Panhandle, which Bowman argues had rejected liberalism since the 1930s. The author contends how Woodward’s political views, religious affiliation and appearance were at odds with rural conservatives, who regarded him as a threat to Hereford’s conservative political culture even though he was not a leftist. Woodward’s employment was abruptly terminated because he joined the ACLU, which led him to file a civil suit due to school officials’ violation of his constitutional rights, according to Bowman. The last two chapters reconstruct the events of Woodward’s civil rights case to further portray the drama of this clash of cultures that was played out in the courtroom. The ”Afterword” provides Woodward’s final retrospective after more than forty years since his dismissal.

Bowman’s research incorporates insightful data from local archival sources, including legal documents and school records, and in-depth interviews about Woodward’s experiences as a teacher and his interactions with rural conservatives. Overall, this study reveals how the Texas Panhandle set itself apart from other parts of the country in asserting its uniqueness or sense of “regional exceptionalism.” The only shortcoming here is the lack of first-hand “voices” or information from interviews with rural conservatives mentioned in the book. Nevertheless, You Will Never Be One of Usis an impressive study and a major contribution to the historiography of the culture wars in rural A

Reviewed by:

• My Darling Boys: A Family at War, 1941–1947by Fred H. Allison
• Luke Truxal

It is not hard to find many personal and family histories that describe the experiences of families in the Second World War. Fred H. Allison in this book does not simply tell the story of the Allison and Grizzle families during the war but uses their stories to highlight the many ways that Americans participated in the air war and how it affected their families. Allison notes that most Americans, like these three men, were not heroes, but their actions represent the millions of Americans who contributed to winning the Second World War either at home or abroad.

Allison’s book follows three young men: Harold Allison, Oscar Allison, and Wiley Grizzle Jr. Each of these men had different experiences, but all wanted to serve in the Army Air Forces during the Second World War. These three young men faced very different challenges. Harold Allison, a pilot, had his deployment delayed because he had hernia surgery during his pre-deployment training with his B-25 crew. As a result, he was unable to participate in the war. Oscar Allison served as a top turret gunner on a B-24 in the Fifteenth Air Force based in Italy. His story gives readers a view of the air war from the perspective of the bombers. He also was shot down and captured. His detailed recollections of his time as a prisoner show his isolation from not only the rest of the war, but his family as well. Wiley Grizzle adds another unique perspective, which is that of both a fighter pilot and a son who never returns. Through Wiley’s story, Allison shows that even late in the war there were quite a few American pilots without a lot of combat experience. As a result, they were not as aware of some of the dangers of air-to-air combat as the veterans, and some of them did not survive.

As the saying goes: ”Never judge a book by its cover.” At first glance, this work appears to focus simply on the three young men who served in the Army Air Forces during the Second World War. One of the more pleasant surprises is the story of the families left behind in Texas. Using family documents, Allison gives readers a better understanding of how the air war affected those back at home, waiting anxiously for letters or news from their friends and family engaged in combat. In one instance, the author shows the anxiety and panic experienced by the Allison family when Oscar was shot down. At one point Ollie Allison, mother [End Page 475]of Oscar, wrote to a different crewman’s father to ascertain her son’s fate. These are the stori

• Southwestern Collection

The ruins of Presidio San Luis de las Amarillas stand about a mile from Menard, Texas, on the northern bank of the San Saba River. A mixture of Spanish-period remains and the vestiges of a Great-Depression-era reconstruction effort, the site is open to visitors under the management of Menard County. Courtesy of THC Collection, Portal of Texas History, University of North Texas.

The 128^th Annual Meeting of the TSHA, held at the Texas A&M Conference Center in College Station February 28 to March 2, 2024, was a tremendous success! Attendance for the meeting and gala totaled 639! We hosted thirty scholarly sessions, ten receptions and banquets, and one offsite tour for our guests, who came from all over Texas, several other states, and outside the United States. Country star Clay Walker performed a great show, and bidding in the various auctions was lively (and prosperous!) We welcomed two new Fellows, Watson C. Arnold and Laurie Jasinski, and handed out an impressive list of other awards for excellence in education and research:

Mary Jon and J. P. Bryan Leadership in Education Award
K–12—Caitlin Baumgarten
College Level—Dr. Kendra DeHart

John W. Crain Texas History Education Award
Patricia Ritchie

Coral Horton Tullis Memorial Prize for Best Book on Texas History
Wesley Phelps—Before Lawrence v. Texas: The Making of a Queer Social Movement

Kate Broocks Bates Award for Historical Research [Book]
Ron Tyler—Texas Lithographs: A Century of History in Images

Al Lowman Memorial Prize [Book]
James Barrera—“We Want Better Education!”: The 1960s Chicano Student Movement, School Walkouts, and the Quest for Education Reform in South Texas

H. Bailey Carroll Award for Best Article in the Southwestern Historical Quarterly
Frank de la Teja—“Women’s Lives in a Spanish-Texas Community: San Antonio de Béxar, 1718–1821,” Vol. 126, No. 3, January 2023

Randolph B. “Mike” Campbell Award for Best Article in the New Handbook of Texas
1st Jesús “Frank” de la Teja—Becerra, María Josefa Agustina
2nd Benjamin V. Allison—Glauben, Max

Lynna Kay Shuffield Memorial Award in Texas Jewish History
Gabrielle Lyle—“Hebrew in Harlingen: An Examination of Jewish Community Development in the Rio Grande Valley,” The Journal of South Texas, Vol. 37, No. 1, Spring 2024 [End Page 452]

The TSHA also continued to support ongoing educational and research efforts through the granting of competitive fellowships:

Cecilia Steinfeldt Fellowship for Research in the Arts and Material Culture Alana Coates—Fi

Reviewed by:

• The Falls of Wichita Falls: An Environmental History of the Red Rolling Plainsby Jahue Anderson
• Andrew C. Baker

The Falls of Wichita Fallsis a western story about the troubled relationship between the dreams of city boosters and the harsh environmental realities of the region. Wichita Falls faced the predictable unpredictability of the Red Rolling Plains with its aridity, salinity, and perennial vulnerability to tornadoes and floods. As Jahue Anderson explains, the region’s geography, climate, geology, and history created “these pumpjack-filled, cattle-laden, mesquite-infested red plains” (p. xii).

The opening chapter has all the makings of a great Texas tale. On a sunny day in April 1905, a train bearing President Theodore Roosevelt arrived in Frederick, Oklahoma, about sixty miles northwest of Wichita Falls. The hunter-in-chief had come to chase wolves across the 480,000 acre “Big Pasture,” one of the few remaining places where a man could gallop into the horizon without hindrance. Joining him was a cast of historical characters who could not help but be Western archetypes. There was wolf-grabbing lawman Jon R. Abernathy, western cattlemen Samuel Burk Burnett and W. Tom Waggoner, Texas Ranger captain and rancher William J. “Bill” McDonald, and famed Commanche leader Quanah Parker. The result was a testosterone-fueled collision of Turnerian historical stages that went storming across the Red Rolling Plains.

Eor Anderson, the event offers a tangle of interpretive possibilities. He seizes some of these moments deftly, finding in Roosevelt’s wolf hunt both epilogue and prologue to the region’s environmental history. At other points, though, Anderson clutters the narrative with ecological asides: “what Roosevelt did not understand. . . is that the wolf is a ‘keystone’ species” (p. 19); “modern range management science indicates” (p. 28); and “unfortunately, the president failed to realize the selective killing of predators unbalanced the ecosystem” (p. 34).

The hunt sets the stage for the century of development to follow. That story begins and ends with the twice-mentioned falls of Wichita, which becomes the book’s central metaphor. Stormwaters destroyed the original falls along the Big Wichita River in 1886. As with so many Texas rivers, flash flooding was a persistent reminder of the costs of untamed nature and the need to dam and control. Yet, in this case, the destruction of the falls was also the result of a predictable failure of engineering. The storm overpowered an upstream dam “built by ambitio

• New Light on Presidio San Luis de las Amarillas [San Sabá]
• Allan J. Kuethe (bio) and José Manuel Serrano Álvarez (bio)

Location of Presidio San Luis de las Amarillas based on the map produced by Nicolas de Laffora, August 12, 1767. Courtesy of the Archivo General de Indias [Mapas y Planos, Mexico 05]

With the collapse of the Second Family Compact during the reign of Ferdinand VI (1746–1759), Spain’s frontier policy in its North American empire acquired an aggressive, militarized character, especially where French interests were involved. An important manifestation of this new orientation appeared in the Governorship of Texas with the establishment of Presidio San Luis de las Amarillas on the remote San Saba River in 1757. Designed to counter supposed French adventurism, this post represented an ambitious, perhaps misguided, thrust into the far northwest, which would continue into the early years of Charles III (1759–1788). Taking a view with a broader strategic perspective, the present authors believe that Presidio San Luis, often popularly referred to as Presidio San Sabá, was far more significant than many historians have generally supposed. Indeed, during its apogee from 1758–1763, San Luis ranked as the most important presidio in Texas in terms of size, garrison, and costs, all of which far exceeded those of other strongpoints.¹ Although abandoned during the far-reaching reorganization [End Page 393] of the northern frontier that the Marqués de Rubí initiated in 1766, and then largely forgotten, the origins of Presidio San Luis, its purpose, and its fate reveal much about royal priorities in Texas during the years before, during, and immediately after Spain’s entry into the Seven Years’ War.

The story of Captain Felipe de Rábago y Terán, who commanded Presidio San Luis, is inseparable from its history. Events that occurred during his early years, particularly when he commanded San Luis’s predecessor at San Xavier, have earned Rábago the universal disdain of historians ranging from Fray Juan Agustín Morfi in the eighteenth century to Robert S. Weddle, Donald E. Chipman, and Luis López Elizondo in recent times.² Rábago certainly ranks as one of the most puzzling officials who served in Bourbon Texas. Yet, new information and a fresh assessment of the evidence against him raise questions that place Rábago in a new light. An uncommonly prominent appointee for remote Texas, the captain enjoyed powerful connections in both Spain and Mexico, but his destiny closely reflected the ups and downs of that influence in the torturous politics that pervaded Madrid and Mexico City. There was far