The award-winning historian, Dr. Walter Buenger, of Texas A&M, College Station delivered a lecture October 24 at the historic Concord Church of Omaha on ?Azaleas and Bluebonnets: Constructing a New Northeast Texas on an Old Foundation after 1887.?† Buenger†described a tipping point, around 1910-1915, when the strong ?Lost-Cause,? Southern identity of Northeast Texas, showed a shift, however incomplete, to a stronger Texan identity.†Buenger showed a decline and dwindling in lynching after a strong spike in the 1890s, the advance in support for women voting which pulled Texas away from a Southern orbit, and a willingness to align ?innovative thinking? with ?Texas,? and its surging economy.† Buenger had a superb grasp of the issues, and his ability to mix apt anecdotes with humor made the talk entertaining as well as informative.
One-hundred guests received the address enthusiastically.† The audience was comprised mainly of other state chapters of the Webb Society, the student auxiliary of the Texas State Historical Association.† There were also seventeen students, and faculty from Northeast Texas Community College, and a contingent of local residents.
Copies of Buenger?s book about Northeast Texas,†The Path to a Modern South†and the new book on Mount Pleasant by Dr. Melissa Weinbrenner and James McGregor were sold after the address.
Before the address, each Webb Chapter provided their chapter reports.† Miranda Mendoza (Mount Pleasant), Brian Taylor (Mount Pleasant), and William Villalobos (Winnsboro), all NTCC honors students, previewed a trailer of their upcoming film on Harriet Potter Ames.
For more information on Buengers address, the Harriet Potter Ames film, or Honors Northeast, contact Dr. Andrew Yox at†ayox@ntcc.eduor 903-434-8229.
