FRONTERAS Fall 2013 • Vol. 22 CENTER FOR GREATER SOUTHWESTERN STUDIES THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS at ARlington Center Launches U.S.-Mexico Website he U.S.-Mexico War is the largest and most significant armed Just as this digitization project aims to bridge the histories of struggle between two nations in the western hemisphere. In two very different nations, it also seeks to serve two separate audi- TMexico, the war left a legacy of bitterness that can be seen to ences. Scholars actively engaged in research and teachers looking for this day. In the United States, tensions between North and South ways to engage their students tend to approach the same subject in soon eclipsed the clash with Mexico in the national imagination. very different ways. It is hoped that this project will be of benefit to Abraham Lincoln alluded researchers by making avail- to these tensions when he able for the first time online described the United States one of the largest collections in 1858 as “a house divided.” of primary source materials A decade earlier, however, on the U.S. - Mexico War. At North America was a divided the same time, this website continent, the site of conflict is also designed for teach- between two republics that ers, by providing educational had forged two very different resources that can be used destinies since winning their in the classroom. Ultimately, independence from European the goal of A Continent Di- powers. vided is to promote interest at For the past two years, every level in the issues that the Center for Greater South- confronted the two North western Studies and the American republics as they Library at the University struggled to define themselves of Texas at Arlington have during their early national been working to develop A periods. Continent Divided: The U.S.- The A Continent Divided Mexico War, a website that project began in 2011 with a A Continent Divided Homepage examines the 1846-1848 con- $10,000 start-up grant from flict. As its title suggests, the website is dedicated to presenting the UT Arlington’s College of Liberal Arts. The following year the war as a truly binational struggle, to shine a light on a neglected Center for Greater Southwestern Studies received a $30,000 grant period in the history of both countries. from the Summerlee Foundation. Funding to continue the multi- UT-Arlington is uniquely positioned to undertake this proj- year project into the 2013-14 academic year has been provided by the ect. For almost forty years, the university has acquired a national College of Liberal Arts, the Library, and the Office of the Provost. reputation in the study of the American Southwest, due in no small part When completed, the website will be the most comprehensive inter- to the generosity of Jenkins Garrett, a Fort Worth attorney. Garrett net resource on the U.S.-Mexico War. became interested in the war with Mexico in the 1950s, at a time The site currently features more than 300 separate items from when the conflict was not even listed as a separate category by Special Collections, consisting of a wide range of manuscripts, collectors. In the years that followed, he amassed what would become printed matter, and graphic materials. Two of Special Collections the largest private collection of books, broadsides, song sheets, mili- most significant holdings, the Grayson Prevost Papers and the tary documents, lithographs, maps and ephemera on the U.S.-Mex- Joseph Meginnes Journal, have been entirely transcribed and ico War. In 1973 Garrett donated to UT-Arlington his collection of uploaded to the site. Grayson Prevost served as a surgeon in Zachary more than 10,000 separate items on Texas and the war with Mexico, Taylor’s army; his letters and journal provide valuable insight into a bequest which formed the core of the library’s Special Collections. the early stages of the war. Joseph Meginnes served as a private in Most of these textual materials are unique to UT-Arlington’s Spe- Scott’s army that occupied Mexico City in 1847-48. A prolific writer, cial Collections and have never been accessible online. The archive his journals offer a glimpse into one of the least studied phases of is particularly strong in Mexican sources, with more than 500 the war: the nine-month occupation of Mexico City by U.S. forces. proclamations issued by Mexican political and civilian authorities. In addition, the site features more than fifty translated Mexican continued on next page 1 CENTERNEWS proclamations, as well as more than thirty biographies of key partici- pants and a dozen contextual essays. Although the site has only been operational for the past year, it Pulitzer Prize Winner has already garnered considerable interest. By the summer of 2013, to Speak at Cynthia Ann the site was receiving an average of 3,000 hits per month. Organized topically, the site currently examines such subject areas as: the Road and Quanah Parker to War, Camp Life, and the Battle of Monterrey. Plans are currently underway to add new subject areas in 2013- Symposium, April, 2014 14, including Women and War and the War at Home. The site can be ulitzer Prize winner Glenn Frankel, author of the re- accessed at: http://library.uta.edu/usmexicowar/index.php cent bestseller, The Searchers: The Making of An Ameri- Pcan Legend, will take part in a two-day symposium on Cynthia Ann and Quanah Parker in the spring. The sympo- Center to Host sium will take place on two consecutive days, April 17-18, in the Sixth Floor Parlor of the Main Library. On Thursday, Environmentalist Author April 17, at 12:30 p.m., F. Todd Smith (University of North Texas) and Joaquín Rivaya-Martínez (Texas State University) William deBuys will examine the lives of Cynthia Ann Parker and Quanah illiam deBuys, author of seven Parker in the larger context of nineteenth century Coman- books on the environment, will che-Anglo relations. On Friday, April 18, at 1 p.m., Frankel, Wdeliver a lunchtime presentation Randi Tanglen (Austin College), and Dustin Tahmahkera on his most recent book, A Great Aridness: (Southwestern University) will examine the ways in which Climate Change and the Future of the Ameri- these events have can Southwest (Oxford University Press, been portrayed 2012). Often mentioned alongside such in popular cul- authors as John McPhee and Wallace Steg- ture, focusing on ner, Bill deBuys is a scholar who speaks and the captivity nar- writes with passion about environmental stewardship. In A Great rative in American Aridness, deBuys ranges from Las Vegas to Mesa Verde to the Glen literature and film. Canyon Dam as he examines the implications of a drier future for Professor Frankel, the American Southwest. His work transcends the regional, howev- who is chair of the er. For example, his work also examines the U.S.-Mexico border, the School of Journal- dependence of both countries on the Colorado River, and its impli- ism at the Uni- cations for the ongoing immigration debate. DeBuys explains why versity of Texas at we should care about these places, and asks us to consider the nation- Austin, will discuss al and international importance of climate change in the Southwest. his book, a history DeBuys’s earlier works include Enchantment and Exploitation: of the Parker Raid The Life and Hard Times of a New Mexico Mountain Range(Univer - in 1836 and its sity of New Mexico Press, 1985); River of Traps (University of New development as an Mexico Press, 1990), which was recognized as a New York Times No- iconic western by table Book of the Year and was one of three finalists for the Pulitzer director John Ford featuring John Wayne, at a Friends of the Prize in general non-fiction in 1991; Salt Dreams: Land and Water Library meeting at 7:30 p.m. that evening (see page 4 for a in Low-Down California (University of New Mexico Press, 1999); review of the book). All events will be free and open to the and Seeing Things Whole: the Essential John Wesley Powell (Shear- public. water Press, 2001). DeBuys is currently working on a book of the In conjunction with the symposium, the Center will bring Southwest’s most iconic sites, such as Acoma, the Grand Canyon, to campus the photographic exhibit, “The Story of Cynthia and Carlsbad Caverns. Ann and Quanah Parker,” a collection of 45 photographs The talk is scheduled from 12-1:30 p.m. on Wednesday, February on loan from the Texas Lakes Trail Heritage Program, and 12, 2014, and will be held in the Sixth Floor Parlor of the UT Arling- will be held in the Library Parlor from April to May, 2014. ton Main Library. The event is free and open to the general public. (see page 5 for a review of the book) 2 CENTERNEWS Center Fellow Updates Sam W. Haynes edited with former Center Fellow Douglas Postcolonial Studies. He offered retrospective papers on develop- Richmond an anthology of essays, The Mexican Revolution: ments in Utopian Studies and American Indian studies at the From Conflict to Consolidation, 1910-1941 (College Station: Society for Utopian Studies Conference and the Modern Lan- Texas A&M University Press, 2013). In April he organized guage Association meeting. Currently he is writing an article on and delivered a paper at the 48th annual Walter Prescott Webb the concept of authenticity in American Indian fiction. Memorial Lectures, “Contested Empire: Rethinking the Texas Gerald Saxon is currently associate professor of history at UT Revolution.” The conference papers will be published in 2014 Arlington after having spent twenty-five years in library admin- by Texas A&M University Press, and will be edited by Dr.