Alwyn Barr
| Chester Alwyn Barr, Jr.
(Historian and Professor Emeritus at Texas Tech University) | |
|---|---|
| Born | January 18, 1938 |
| Political Party | Democrat |
| Spouse | Nancy Dement Barr Two daughters: |
Chester Alwyn Barr, Jr. (born January 18, 1938) is an American historian who specializes in African-American studies, the American South, the American Civil War, and Reconstruction.[1] He is a professor emeritus and former chairman of the history department at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas.
Background
Barr was the only child of Chester A. Barr, Sr. (1885-1973), a native of Austin, and the former Wilma Matlock (1905-1987). Barr received his Bachelor of Arts (1959), Master of Arts (1961), and Ph.D. (1966) from the University of Texas at Austin. He joined the Texas Tech faculty in 1969.[2]
Barr and his wife, the former Nancy Dement, reside in Lubbock. Their daughters are Juliana Barr, a professor of history at Duke University whose best known work is Peace Came in the Form of a Woman: Indians and Spaniards in the Texas Borderlands (2007),[3] and Alicia Barr, a psychology professor at the two-year South Plains College in Levelland west of Lubbock.[4]
Scholarly works
Barr's primary research focus on the history of the Civil War, Reconstruction, the American South, and African Americans. His publications include Polignac's Texas Brigade (published while he was still in graduate school in 1964, second edition, 1998),[5] a study of Camille Armand Jules Marie, Prince de Polignac (1832-1913) and the Texan soldiers who fought in 1864 in the Battle of Mansfield south of Shreveport in northwestern Louisiana, a victory for the Confederacy. A monument to the Texan soldiers was dedicated at the site on the centennial of the Civil War battle in April 1964. His first major monograph is the 1971 Reconstruction to Reform: Texas Politics, 1876-1906 (later in a second edition, 2000). [6] Next came the first edition (1973) of Black Texans: A History of African-Americans in Texas, 1528-1971 which he later updated with a new preface, new chapter on 1970-1995, and new index (University of Oklahoma Press, 1996).[7]
Another Barr work is The African Texans (2004), which describes the experience of free blacks and slaves prior to the Civil War and concludes with late 20th-century political developments.[8] In 1981, Barr and Robert A. Calvert, late historian at Texas A&M University in College Station co-edited Black Leaders: Texans for Their Times.[9] In 2000, Barr wrote the introduction to Black Cowboys of Texas, edited by Sara Reid Massey (1938-2013).[10]
In addition to his previously mentioned research interests, Barr has also done extensive research in military history. In 1990, he published a short study entitled Texans in Revolt: The Battle for San Antonio, 1835 that remains the primary study of the capture of San Antonio by Texans and Tejanos during the Texas Revolution prior to the fall of the Alamo in the spring of 1836.[11] He has published forty-eight articles in history journals including Civil War History, Military Affairs, the Journal of African American History, the Southwestern Historical Quarterly, the Social Science Quarterly, and Military History of the West. He secured multiple awards for his teaching, research, and leadership at Texas Tech.[12] In 1992-1993 academic year, he served as the president of the Texas State Historical Association.[13] In 2001, Barr received the Outstanding Researcher Award from the Texas Tech College of Arts and Sciences. In 2005, he obtained the Faculty Distinguished Leadership Award from the Texas Tech Association of Parents.[1] In 2011, Barr was inducted into the Texas Institute of Letters.[14]
More than thirty doctoral students at Texas Tech completed their studies under Barr, and eleven of their dissertations were revised and published as books. He has been a consultant for the National Park Service, National Endowment for the Humanities, Humanities Texas, the U.S. Department of Justice, Smithsonian Productions, and for the 2006 public television documentary Texas Ranch House, a reality show in which modern Americans attempted to live as they would have in the year 1867.[1]
Among Barr's colleagues at Texas Tech were Paul H. Carlson, Allan Kuethe, Dan Flores, and Ernest Wallace. In 2012, Barr wrote the foreword to the book Where the West Begins: Debating Texas Identity, by Glen Sample Ely of Fort Worth. The book is a new interpretation of the areas west of the 100th meridian which encompass West Texas.[15]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Alwyn Barr. Texas Tech University. Retrieved on October 16, 2010.
- ↑ Texas Tech University Teaching Faculty. depts.ttu.edu. Retrieved on November 16, 2012, no longer accessible on-line.
- ↑ Juliana Barr | Scholars@Duke profile
- ↑ Alicia Barr- South Plains College
- ↑ (March 1, 1998) Polignac's Texas Brigade. Texas A&M University Press. Retrieved on October 16, 2010.
- ↑ Reconstruction to Reform: Texas Politics, 1876–1906. By Alwyn Barr. (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1971. xiv + 315 pp. Maps, illustrations, notes, bibliography, and index. $8.50.) | Journal of American History | Oxford Academic.
- ↑ Alwyn Barr. blackpast.org (2009, no longer accessible on-line.).
- ↑ (February 19, 2004) The African Texans. Texas A&M University Press. ISBN 978-1-58544-321-5. Retrieved on October 16, 2010.
- ↑ A Guide to the Robert Calvert Papers, 1970-1995. Texas Archival Resources Online. Retrieved on October 15, 2010.
- ↑ Sara Reid Massey, Independent Historian. blackpast.org. Retrieved on February 3, 2025.
- ↑ (1990) Texans in Revolt: The Battle for San Antonio, 1835. University of Texas Press. ISBN 978-0-292-78120-7. Retrieved on October 16, 2010.
- ↑ Board Biographies. Humanities Texas (2007). Retrieved on October 16, 2010.
- ↑ Publications. Texas State Historical Association (March 2, 2007). Retrieved on October 15, 2010.
- ↑ "New TIL Members Elected," http://www.texasinstituteofletters.org/newsletters/Jan-Feb-March%202011%20newsletter%20-%20final.htm,no longer accessible on-line.
- ↑ Texas History.com. texashistory.com. Retrieved on March 25, 2012.
