By: Dr. Andrew Yox, Honors Director
Two former NTCC Presidential Scholars recently published award-winning scholarship that was developed and accepted for publication while at NTCC. Neida Perez, now at UT Tyler, published her Caldwell-Award winning study on the Texas war against pathogens, and Aubrey Watkins, now at East Texas A&M, published her Caldwell-Award winning work on the rise of the Cowboy Church. Both found acceptance as state-wide standouts in Touchstone, a collegiate journal published by the Texas State Historical Association since 1982. Though in recent years the journal has gone online, Touchstone is an anomalous, “for-undergraduates” collegiate journal, as it has been published in cloth since 1982.
Though Texas has won most of the standard wars its citizens have entered, the fight with pathogens—viruses and infectious bacteria—has not gone as well, according to Perez. Texas lagged in the fight against the dreaded nineteenth-century scourge, Yellow Fever; it opted for patriotic parades in the face of the deadly Spanish Flu epidemic in 1918, and proved lackluster with the coronavirus. The state has concentrated instead on the “vice-diseases” connected with overeating and smoking—heart attacks, and cancer. Watkins’ article detailed the surprising rise of the Cowboy Church in Texas. In the late-nineteenth century, ‘cowboys’ were so associated with debauchery and low life, that some Texan officials such as land commissioner, John James Terrell, hoped that all cowboys would leave the state. However, in the aftermath of the World War II era when the cowboy became associated with virtuous Americana, several ex-Texas cowhands became evangelists, and used the rodeo, as their starting point. The remarkable growth of this emergent church thereafter, though reaching all parts of the nation, has put a particular spotlight on Texas culture.
The essays of Perez, and Watkins constitute the 30th, and 31st sole-author publications of student work developed at NTCC since 2010. Both high-achieving students stand to benefit from these publications, and cite them as they advance in their careers. Perez, who retained her status as an honors student at UT Tyler’s honors college, is currently studying for the Dental Admission Test (DAT). Watkins currently is studying for the LSAT, hoping to move into the practice of law.
Honors Director, Dr. Andrew Yox notes, “For publications like this to happen, many different people work in concert. The student effort is, of course, special. I remember Perez and Watkins as each having a special niche in the history of our honors experience at NTCC. Perez was a brilliant conceptualizer, but she was also driven by a kind of public service to master a long and complicated history of disease in Texas. Watkins showed more improvement as a scholarly student presenter than anyone I can remember, in the end winning an intervarsity award for her poster. In addition, we count the support of our honors patrons who provided both students with special scholarships, awards, and encouragement. Finally, a shout-out should be heard for Lisa Berg, Director of Educational Services at the Texas State Historical Association, and her associates. With limited resources, Berg and her group have kept alive the oldest collegiate journal dedicated to state history in the nation. Without their over-the-top zeal, our students, no matter how talented, would not have had this terrific opportunity.”
