East Texas Historical Journal Volume 43 Issue 2 Article 1 10-2005 ETHJ Vol-43 No-2 Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/ethj Part of the United States History Commons Tell us how this article helped you. Recommended Citation (2005) "ETHJ Vol-43 No-2," East Texas Historical Journal: Vol. 43 : Iss. 2 , Article 1. Available at: https://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/ethj/vol43/iss2/1 This Full Issue is brought to you for free and open access by the History at SFA ScholarWorks. It has been accepted for inclusion in East Texas Historical Journal by an authorized editor of SFA ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact [email protected]. VOLUME XLIII 2005 NUMBER 2 .. HISTORICAL JOURNAL EAST TEXAS HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION 2004-2005 OFFICERS Cary D. Wintz President R.G. Dean First Vice President Dan K. Utley Second Vice President Portia L. Gordon Secretary-Treasurer DIRECTORS Priscilla M. Bcnhatn Houston 2005 Jonathan K. Gerl2nd DiOOIl , 2005 Beverly J. Rowe Texarkana 2005 Margaret Agnor Marshall 2006 Dennis Bradford Nacogdoches 2006 Ted Lawe Emory , 2006 Doris Bowman , Lufkin 2007 Tom Crum Granbury 2007 James Smallwood Gainesville 2007 Ty Cashion Huntsville ex-President Gail K. Beil , Marshall , ex-President EDITORIAL BOARD Valentine J. Belfiglio ", Dallas Bob Bowman , , Lufkin Garna L. Christian Houston Ouida Dean , Nacogdoches Patricia A. Gajda Tyler Robert L. Glover , Flint Bobby H. Johnson , Nacogdoches Patricia Kell , Baytown Max S. Lale , Fot1 Worth Chuck Parsons , Luling Fred Tarpley ,, , Commeree Archie P. McDonald EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR AND EDITOR Mark D. Barringer ASSOCIATE EDITOR MEMBERSHIP INSTITUTIONAL MEMBERS pay $100 annually LIFE MEMBERS pay $300 or more BENEFACTOR pays $100, PATRON pays $50 annually STUDENT MEMBERS pay $12 annually FAMILY MEMBERS pay $35 annually REGULAR MEMBERS pay $25 annually Journals $7.50 per copy P.O. Box 6223 Stephen F. Austin State University Nacogdoches, TX 75962 936-468~2407 e-mail: [email protected] http://www.easttexashistorical.org © Copyright 2005 XLIII - No. 2 - East Texas Historical Association EAST TEXAS HISTORICAL JOURNAL Volume XLIII 2005 NVMBER2 CONTENTS PLACELI::SSNt:SS AI\D THE RATIONALE FOR HISTORIC PRESERVATION: NATIONAL CONTEXTS AND EAST TEXAS EXAMPLES hy Jeffrey A. Owens. .:\ MORE THAt\" BRICKS AND MORTAR: PRESERVING HISTORIC COURTHOL'SES IN EAST TEXAS by Dan K. Utley and Bob Brinkman 32 PRESERVING ROSENWALD SCHOOLS TN EAST TEXAS: THE SAI\D FLAT AND RICHLAND SCHOOL PROJECT by James Conrad and 'Jhendnre M. Lnwe 50 RESTORIKG THE FINEST HOUSE IN TOWN: THE WEISMAN-HIRSCH HOME IN MARSHALL, TEXAS hy Gail K Beil 58 EAST TEXAS NEWS A\l1) EVENTS by /"/ark D. Barringer 65 BOOK NOTES hy Archie P McDonald 67 Archie P. McDonald. Executive Director and Editor Mark D. Barringer, Associate Editor STEPHEN F. AUSTIN STATE UNIVERSITY P.O. BOX 6223 NACOGDOCHES, TEXAS 75962 936-468-2407 e-mail: [email protected] http://www.easttexashistorical.org 2 EAST TEXAS HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION BOOKS REVIE'WED Bums. Saving Lh'es, Training Caregivers, Making Discoverie.~: A Cmll'nnial Hiswry of the University of Texm' Medical Branch at Galve,~tml hy Beverly J. Rowe Kelley, The Foundatiom ofTexan Philanthropy hy Jerry E. Holbert Witthff, Vaquero: Genesi~' ofthe Te.ms Co\t'bov hy hands Edward Abernethy Mahoney, College Rodeo: From SlIm.. to Sport by Linda Cross Chandler. On huJependence Creek: The Story ofa Texas Ranch by Page S. Foshee Blanton, The Strange Career ({{ BilinRual Education in Texas. IH36-J981 by Gene Preuss Morton. Reluctant Lieutenant: From Basic lU OCS in the Sixties hy Max S. Lale Reid, The Impmbable Rise ofRedneck Rock by Francis Edward Abernethy Wood. Dmwl in Hotlsto1Z: Bayou City Blues by Kathleen Hudson Erickson, The Modern Cowboy by Guy Gillette Shabazz, Advancing Democrac.....: African Americans and the Struggle for Acc:es~' lind Eqllity in Hi1{her EducaTion in Texas by Cary D. Wintz McLemore, Irlventin~ Texas: Early Hi.Horians afthe lAme Star Stare by Mark Fink Nail, I Am Not the Woman I Was by Hazel Shelron Abernethy Durden-Nelson, J Just Called Her Momma by Hazel Shelton Abernethy Brooks, Seven Befon: Seventy: Onl! Woman:~ Quest jor the Seven Continents by Hazel Shelton Abernethy Sandell,ln a Fevered Land by Sarah Cheney Watson Bingham. All Roads Lead Home hy Sarah Cheney Watson McCoy, The Heart Twisters by Sarah Cheney Watson McCan, Gringo Verde: A Nm:e/ ofRevolution and Redemption by Sarah Cheney Watson Grider/Rodenberger, Let:~ Hear It: Siories by Te.xa.~ Women Writers by Deborah Cole AbemethylLincecumNick, The Family Saga: A Collection of Texa~ Family Legends by Robert H. Butts Billingsley, Commu.nities of Kinship: Antebellum Familie.s and the Settlement of the Colton Fronfier by Lauren Ashley Laumen Cotham, Sabine Pas!): The C()nfederacy:~ Thermopylae by James C. Maroney Ellison, Calvary Baptist Church Beaumont, Texas: A Centennial History 1904-2()()4 by John W. Storey Harper, Eleven Days in Hell: Thl' 1974 Carrasco Prison Siege in Huntsville. Texas by Patrick McConal Early, A Texas Raptist Hi,~tory Sourcebook: A Companion to McBeth:~ Texas Baptists by Ron Ellison McKinley, Chinqua Where? The Spirit ofRural America, 1947-1955 by Mark Barringer Ainslie, Long, Dark Road: Bill King and Murder in Jasper. Texas by Bob Bowman Etulain. Western Lives: A Biographical History ofthe American West by Robert W. Righter ShawlPedersonIWilliams, Franklin D. Roosevelt and the TransformatirJn of the Supreme Courl by Mark W. Beasley Sampson, John L. O'Sullivan and His Times by Linda S. Hudson Donaldson, Liheralism's Last Hurrah: The Presidenrial Campaign of 1964 by Patrick Cox Boles/Johnson. "Origins of the Nea-' South" Fifty Years Later: The Continuing Influence of a Historical Clank by Walter L. Buenger EAST TEXAS HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION 3 PLACELESSNESS AND THE RATIONALE FOR HISTORIC PRESERVATION: NATIONAL CONTEXTS AND EAST TEXAS EXAMPLES By Jeffrey A. Owens The spellcheckcT on my computer does not recognize "placelessness" as a word, and it is not in the unabridged dictionary. However, an internet search pulled 2,000 hits for the tenn, and the meaning is readily comprehended. "Placelessness" is a mental response to a generic environment. It can mean disorientation, caused by the disappearance of landmarks, or alienation, resulting from peoples' dislike of their surroundings. It describes a place with­ out heritage, one that lacks identity or is artificial and meaningless. Edward Relph coined the tenn in 1976 in Place and Placelessness, a study of envi­ ronmental philosophy. That same year, Yi-Fu Tuan, a geographer, founded the discipline of Human (i.e. "Psycho") Geography by publishing Space and Place: The Perspective ofExperience. Tuan explored how people feel about the "where" they inhabit; how they become atcached to homes, neighbor­ hoods, and nations; and how thesc feelings overlap into myth or the experi­ ence of the sacred. Other books followed, like Cosmos and Hearth, The Necessity for Ruins, The Poetics of Space, and Postmodern Geographies. Authors applied Placelessness to fields as diverse as theology, psychology, anthropology, literature, and theater. Concerns about Placelessncss also attached themselves to historic preservation. For example, in 1999, William Leach published Country of Exiles: The Destruction of Place in American Life. Leach depicted "a vast landscape of the temporary" in which fungible executives, itinerant managers, cross-trained employees, and hourly workers float through the landscape like disembodied phantoms. Most want continu­ ity and stability, but the realities of the mass-culcure economy make that increasingly difficult to attain. Meanwhile, towns and cities grow ever more generic, sporting the same corporate logos in every business district and the same housing in every neighborhood. What remains to distinguish one place from another? I Of course, worries about the obliteration ofAmerican landmarks pre-date the discovery of "placelessness" as an intellectual phenomenon. This article discusses the merits of historic preservation and identifies several restoration categories. Nationally known prototypes will be presented, then the emphasis will be on East Texas. Our region has great resources for preservation, but its people lack vision. Many East Texans seldom travel to places where historic preservation is practiced, so they discollnt the potential of the built environ­ ment. This article's focus on the achievements of East Texas preservationists is intended to stimulate a greater awareness of what could be accomplished "right here!" Placeless Geography, according to Ingolf Vogeler, occurs when "build­ ings that are something are being replaced by nothing." Vogeler defines some- Jeffrey Owens teaches histvry al Tyler Junior Cnlle/?e. 4 EAST TEXAS HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION thing buildings as those that arc "distinctive, unrepeatable, and rooted in time and place." The idea that some buildings are more meaningful than others, due to their age, style, or method of construction, is fundamental to preserva­ tionists. Paul Fussell, in a book ealled Class, argued that the American mld­ dIe class suffers from "rootlessness," moving at the beck and call of corpora­ tions, constantly fearing the loss ofjohs and familiar envlronments. Old hous­ es and antiques, or at least tasteful imitations, lend an air of permanence. The prosperous but rootless, living with instability. seek permanence through sym­ bols of the past. 2 lames Kunstler. in The Geography ofNowhere. veers into actual hatred for the placeless landscape. Kunstler decries an America of "highway strips, parking lots. housing tracts, mega-malls, junked cities. and ravaged country­ side." He fears that "a land full of places that are not worth caring about. will soon be a nation and a way of life that is not worth defending." John Brinckerhoff Jackson, a Harvard and Berkeley professor, the so-called "god­ father ofAmerican landscape studies." makes no ethical judgments about con­ temporary landscapes. Instead, he argues that the modern urban environment is not about place and permanence but rather about time and movement. lackson celebrates the same highways, mobile homes, parking lots. and malls that Kunstlcr despises.