Living in the Shadow of a Hell Ship: The Survival Story of U.S. Marine George Burlage, a WWII Prisoner-of-War of the Japanese

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U.S. Marine George Burlage was part of the largest surrender in American history at Bataan and Corregidor in the spring of 1942, where the Japanese captured more than 85,000 troops. More than forty percent would not survive World War II. His prisoner-of-war ordeal began at Cabanatuan near Manila, where the death rate in the early months of World War II was fifty men a day. Sensing that Cabanatuan was a death trap, he managed to get transferred to the isolated island of Palawan to help build an airfield for his captors. Malaria and other tropical diseases caused him to be sent to Manila for treatment in 1943 (a year later, 139 of his fellow POWs were massacred on Palawan). After another year of building airfields, Burlage survived a 38-day voyage in the hull of a Japanese hell ship and ended the war as a miner for Mitsubishi in northern Japan. By sheer luck, strength, and a bit of sabotage, he survived and was freed in September 1945 after the Japanese surrendered. He had endured starvation and torture and lost half of his prewar weight, but no one had killed him. After the war Burlage became a journalist and wrote about …
Date: September 15, 2020
Creator: Burlage, Georgianne
Object Type: Book
System: The UNT Digital Library
Hellcat News (Garnet Valley, Pa.), Vol. 74, No. 1, Ed. 1 Tuesday, September 1, 2020 (open access)

Hellcat News (Garnet Valley, Pa.), Vol. 74, No. 1, Ed. 1 Tuesday, September 1, 2020

Monthly newsletter published by the 12th Armored Division Association, discussing news related to the activities of the U.S. Army unit and updates on previous members of the division.
Date: September 1, 2020
Creator: Twelfth Armored Division Association (U.S.)
Object Type: Newspaper
System: The Portal to Texas History
The Naming Commission - Final Report to Congress, Part III: Renaming Department of Defense Assets (open access)

The Naming Commission - Final Report to Congress, Part III: Renaming Department of Defense Assets

Report summarizing the recommendations of The Naming Commission's findings as mandated by the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021, which mandates the removal of names, symbols, displays, monuments and paraphernalia that honor or commemorate the Confederate States of America. "Part III of the Naming Commission 's Final Report .... contains recommendations for the disposition of all Confederacy-affiliated and named Department of Defense assets not already covered" in previous parts of the report. [Executive Summary, Page 2]
Date: September 2022
Creator: United States. Naming Commission.
Object Type: Report
System: The UNT Digital Library

Two Counties in Crisis: Measuring Political Change in Reconstruction Texas

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Two Counties in Crisis offers a rare opportunity to observe how local political cultures are transformed by state and national events. Utilizing an interdisciplinary fusion of history and political science, Robert J. Dillard analyzes two disparate Texas counties—traditionalist Harrison County and individualist Collin County—and examines four Reconstruction governors (Hamilton, Throckmorton, Pease, Davis) to aid the narrative and provide additional cultural context. Commercially prosperous and built on slave labor in the mold of Deep South plantation culture, East Texas’s Harrison County strongly supported secession in 1861. West Texas’s Collin County, characterized by individual and family farms with a limited slave population, favored the Union. During Reconstruction, Collin County became increasingly conservative and eventually bore a great resemblance to Harrison County. By 1876 and the ratification of the regressive Texas Constitution, Collin County had become firmly resistant to all aspects of Reconstruction.
Date: September 2023
Creator: Dillard, Robert J.
Object Type: Book
System: The UNT Digital Library
Texas Highways, Volume 68, Number 9, September 2021 (open access)

Texas Highways, Volume 68, Number 9, September 2021

Monthly travel magazine discussing locations and events in Texas to encourage travel within the state.
Date: September 2021
Creator: Texas. Department of Transportation.
Object Type: Journal/Magazine/Newsletter
System: The Portal to Texas History

Texas Ranger Captain William L. Wright

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William L. Wright (1868–1942) was born to be a Texas Ranger, and hard work made him a great one. Wright tried working as a cowboy and farmer, but it did not suit him. Instead, he became a deputy sheriff and then a Ranger in 1899, battling a mob in the Laredo Smallpox Riot, policing both sides in the Reese-Townsend Feud, and winning a gunfight at Cotulla. His need for a better salary led him to leave the Rangers and become a sheriff. He stayed in that office longer than any of his predecessors in Wilson County, keeping the peace during the so-called Bandit Wars, investigating numerous violent crimes, and surviving being stabbed on the gallows by the man he was hanging. When demands for Ranger reform peaked, he was appointed as a captain and served for most of the next twenty years, retiring in 1939 after commanding dozens of Rangers. Wright emerged unscathed from the Canales investigation, enforced Prohibition in South Texas, and policed oil towns in West Texas, as well as tackling many other legal problems. When he retired, he was the only Ranger in service who had worked under seven governors. Wright has also been honored as an …
Date: September 2021
Creator: McCaslin, Richard B.
Object Type: Book
System: The UNT Digital Library
Rains County Leader (Emory, Tex.), Vol. 134, No. 14, Ed. 1 Tuesday, September 8, 2020 (open access)

Rains County Leader (Emory, Tex.), Vol. 134, No. 14, Ed. 1 Tuesday, September 8, 2020

Weekly newspaper from Emory, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.
Date: September 8, 2020
Creator: Hill, Earl, III
Object Type: Newspaper
System: The Portal to Texas History
The Altus Times (Altus, Okla.), Vol. 114, No. 61, Ed. 1 Thursday, September 10, 2020 (open access)

The Altus Times (Altus, Okla.), Vol. 114, No. 61, Ed. 1 Thursday, September 10, 2020

Weekly newspaper from Altus, Oklahoma that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.
Date: September 10, 2020
Creator: unknown
Object Type: Newspaper
System: The Gateway to Oklahoma History
The Baytown Sun (Baytown, Tex.), Vol. 100, No. 136, Ed. 1 Sunday, September 6, 2020 (open access)

The Baytown Sun (Baytown, Tex.), Vol. 100, No. 136, Ed. 1 Sunday, September 6, 2020

Triweekly newspaper from Baytown, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.
Date: September 6, 2020
Creator: Bloom, David
Object Type: Newspaper
System: The Portal to Texas History