A Study of the Anti-Catholic Bias Contained Within Jacob Burckhardt's The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (open access)

A Study of the Anti-Catholic Bias Contained Within Jacob Burckhardt's The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy

This work examines the anti-Catholic bias of Jacob Burckhardt as he employed it in the Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy. A biographical chapter examines his early education in the Lutheran seminary and the influence of his educators at the University of Berlin. The Civilization is examined in three critical areas: Burckhardt's treatment of the popes in his chapter "The State as a Work of Art," the reform tendencies of the Italian humanists which Burckhardt virtually ignored, and the rise of confraternities in Italy. In each instance, Burckhardt demonstrated a clear bias against the Catholic Church. Further study could reveal if this initial bias was perpetuated through later "Burckhardtian" historians.
Date: May 1996
Creator: Kistner, Michael P. (Michael Patrick)
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Anglo-American Council on Productivity: 1948-1952 British Productivity and the Marshall Plan (open access)

The Anglo-American Council on Productivity: 1948-1952 British Productivity and the Marshall Plan

The United Kingdom's postwar economic recovery and the usefulness of Marshall Plan aid depended heavily on a rapid increase in exports by the country's manufacturing industries. American aid administrators, however, shocked to discover the British industry's inability to respond to the country's urgent need, insisted on aggressive action to improve productivity. In partial response, a joint venture, called the Anglo-American Council on Productivity (AACP), arranged for sixty-six teams involving nearly one thousand people to visit U.S. factories and bring back productivity improvement ideas. Analyses of team recommendations, and a brief review of the country's industrial history, offer compelling insights into the problems of relative industrial decline. This dissertation attempts to assess the reasons for British industry's inability to respond to the country's economic emergency or to maintain its competitive position faced with the challenge of newer industrializing countries.
Date: May 1999
Creator: Gottwald, Carl H.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Beyond the Merchants of Death: the Senate Munitions Inquiry of the 1930s and its Role in Twentieth-Century American History (open access)

Beyond the Merchants of Death: the Senate Munitions Inquiry of the 1930s and its Role in Twentieth-Century American History

The Senate Munitions Committee of 1934-1936, chaired by Gerald Nye of North Dakota, provided the first critical examination of America's modern military establishment. The committee approached its task guided by the optimism of the progressive Social Gospel and the idealism of earlier times, but in the middle of the munitions inquiry the nation turned to new values represented in Reinhold Niebuhr's realism and Franklin D. Roosevelt's Second New Deal. By 1936, the committee found its views out of place in a nation pursuing a new course and in a world threatening to break out in war. Realist historians writing in the cold war period (1945-1990) closely linked the munitions inquiry to isolationism and created a one-dimensional history in which the committee chased evil "merchants of death." The only book-length study of the munitions investigation, John Wiltz's In Search of Peace, published in 1963, provided a realist interpretation. The munitions inquiry went beyond the merchants of death in its analysis of the post-World War I American military establishment. A better understanding emerges when the investigation is considered not only within an isolationist framework, but also as part of the intellectual, cultural, and political history of the interwar years. In particular, Franklin …
Date: May 1996
Creator: Coulter, Matthew Ware
System: The UNT Digital Library
Standing in the Gap: Subposts, Minor Posts, and Picket Stations and the Pacification of the Texas Frontier, 1866-1886 (open access)

Standing in the Gap: Subposts, Minor Posts, and Picket Stations and the Pacification of the Texas Frontier, 1866-1886

This dissertation describes the various military outposts on the Texas frontier between 1866 and 1886. It is arranged geographically, with each chapter covering a major fort or geographical area and the smaller posts associated with it. Official military records and government reports serve as the primary sources of data. In 1866 when the United States Army returned to the defense of Texas after four years of civil war, the state's frontier lay open to depredations from several Indian tribes and from lawless elements in Mexico. The army responded to those attacks by establishing several lines of major forts to protect the various danger areas of the frontier. To extend its control and protection to remote, vulnerable, or strategically important points within its jurisdiction, each major fort established outposts. Two main categories of outposts existed in Texas, subposts and picket stations. Subposts served as permanent scouting camps or guarded strategic points or lines of communication. Picket stations protected outlying locations, such as stage stations, that were particularly vulnerable to attack. Because Indians raiding in Texas usually operated in fairly small groups, garrisons at outposts were similarly small. Company-sized detachments generally garrisoned subposts, and picket stations seldom held more than a dozen …
Date: May 1995
Creator: Uglow, Loyd M. (Loyd Michael)
System: The UNT Digital Library
An Analysis of Status: Women in Texas, 1860-1920 (open access)

An Analysis of Status: Women in Texas, 1860-1920

This study examined the status of women in Texas from 1860 to 1920. Age, family structure and composition, occupation, educational level, places of birth, wealth, and geographical persistence are used as the measurements of status. For purposes of analysis, women are grouped according to whether they were married, widowed, divorced, or single.
Date: May 1999
Creator: Breashears, Margaret Herbst
System: The UNT Digital Library
"But a Mournful Remedy": Divorce in Two Texas Counties, 1841-1880 (open access)

"But a Mournful Remedy": Divorce in Two Texas Counties, 1841-1880

Little scholarship has been dedicated to nineteenth-century Texas family life and no published scholarship to date has addressed the more specific topic of divorce. This study attempts to fill that gap in the historiography through a quantitative analysis of 373 divorce actions filed in Washington and Harrison Counties. The findings show a high degree of equity between men and women in court decisions granting divorces, and in property division and custody rulings. Texas women enjoyed a relatively high degree of legal and personal autonomy, which can be attributed, in part, to a property-rights heritage from Spanish civil law.
Date: May 1999
Creator: Pruitt, Francelle LeNaee
System: The UNT Digital Library
Americans who did not wait: the American Legion of the Canadian Expeditionary Force, 1915-1917 (open access)

Americans who did not wait: the American Legion of the Canadian Expeditionary Force, 1915-1917

This study examines the five American Legion battalions of the Canadian Expeditionary Force formed in 1915 specifically to recruit American volunteers for the Canadian overseas contingent of the First World War. This study reviews the organization of Canada's militia and Anglo-American relations before examining the formation of the American Legion, the background of its men, and the diplomatic repercussions it sparked. This study is based largely on material in the Public Archives of Canada including war records and the personal papers of several participants. During its brief existence, the American Legion precipitated constitutional, diplomatic, and political problems. The issues the American Legion raised were mostly solved by America's entry in the war. The episode hastened the maturity of Canada as a nation.
Date: May 1996
Creator: Smylie, Eric
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Influence of Pragmatism in the Essays of Randolph Bourne (open access)

The Influence of Pragmatism in the Essays of Randolph Bourne

This study traces the influence of the American philosophy of pragmatism in the writing of the Progressive Era intellectual Randolph Bourne (1886-1918),. In courses with John Dewey at Columbia University and through the books of William James, pragmatism became a major intellectual factor in Bourne's social and cultural criticism. The philosophy remained so to the end of his brief career. From pragmatism, Bourne learned a method of challenging a restrictive status quo. In his essays, Bourne sought harmony between analytical reasoning and the imagination in order to promote self-growth along with the creation of a more humane society. Bourne promoted individualism and the need for transcendent values in modern industrial society.
Date: May 1993
Creator: Brown, Byron D. (Byron Delano)
System: The UNT Digital Library
Dante, Machiavelli, and Luther: The Evolution of the Modern State (open access)

Dante, Machiavelli, and Luther: The Evolution of the Modern State

The evolution of the State was a process which went through many stages. Analysis of the modern State tends to begin with the Enlightenment; however, Dante Alighieri, Niccolo Machiavelli, and Martin Luther each represented early phases of this evolution. The theories of these men were closely tied to their evaluation of man's nature. Their main objectives were separation of the State from the Church and the definition of the rulers obligations to his subjects. Although humanism influenced all of them to varying degrees, each developed unique views of the State. Elements of these views can be detected in more modern theorists.
Date: May 1991
Creator: Peterson, Rebecca C. (Rebecca Carol)
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Texas Response to the Mexican Revolution: Texans' Involvement with U.S. Foreign Policy Toward Mexico During the Wilson Administration (open access)

The Texas Response to the Mexican Revolution: Texans' Involvement with U.S. Foreign Policy Toward Mexico During the Wilson Administration

The Mexican Revolution probably affected Texas more than any other state. As the Revolution intensified, Texans responded with increased efforts to shape the Mexican policies of the Woodrow Wilson administration. Some became directly involved in the Revolution and the U.S. reaction to it, but most Texans sought to influence American policy toward Mexico through pressure on their political leaders in Austin and Washington. Based primarily on research in the private and public papers of leading state and national political figures, archival sources such as the Congressional Record and the Department of State's decimal file, major newspapers of the era, and respected works, this study details the successes and failures that Texans experienced in their endeavors to influence Wilson's Mexican policies.
Date: May 1994
Creator: Snow, L. Ray (Livveun Ray)
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Communist Party and Soviet Literature (open access)

The Communist Party and Soviet Literature

The Communist Party's control of Soviet literature gradually evolved from the 1920s and reached its height in the 1940s. The amount of control exerted over Soviet literature reflected the strengthening power of the Communist Party. Sources used in this thesis include speeches, articles, and resolutions of leaders in the Communist Party, novels produced by Soviet authors from the 1920s through the 1940s, and analyses of leading critics of Soviet literature and Soviet history. The thesis is structured around the political and literary developments during the periods of 1917-1924, 1924-1932, 1932-1941, and 1946-1949. The conclusion is that the Communist Party seized control of Soviet literature to disseminate Party policy, minimize dissent, and produce propaganda, not to provide an outlet for creative talent.
Date: May 1994
Creator: Clark, Rhonda (Rhonda Ingold)
System: The UNT Digital Library
Charles Beard versus the Founding Fathers: Property Concepts in the Eighteenth Century (open access)

Charles Beard versus the Founding Fathers: Property Concepts in the Eighteenth Century

This thesis deals with the role of property in the formation of the American Constitution and government. Charles Beard's views on property are compared with writings from the eighteenth century. Beard's writings on property and his critics are examined in the first two chapters. Then, the thesis's two historical contexts are evaluated. Concentrating on the Enclosure Acts, the fourth chapter looks at the importance of land to the former Englishmen. The eighteenth century view of property is the focus of the fifth section. The last chapter contrasts the two different views of property. Beard believed that the Constitution was a conservative document that protected the property of the few over the many. The Founding Fathers actually included liberal protections for property in the eighteenth century.
Date: May 1992
Creator: Breaux, Rhonda J. (Rhonda Janise)
System: The UNT Digital Library
Dallas Barrio Women of Power (open access)

Dallas Barrio Women of Power

This thesis discusses Mexican immigration into Texas, and the communities in which the immigrants settled. The focus is on Dallas, with particular emphasis placed upon the women of Little Mexico, a specific barrio there. Sources include interviews with the subjects and their descendants, newspaper articles, journals, unpublished theses about Little Mexico, and books.
Date: May 1992
Creator: Guzman, Jane Bock
System: The UNT Digital Library
Black Nationalism Reinterpreted (open access)

Black Nationalism Reinterpreted

Black nationalism responded to America's failure to examine the effects of slavery's legacy. Its aims represent those issues that were either unsupported by or in opposition to the goals of the civil rights leadership. In particular, the civil rights movement dismissed any claims that the history of slavery had a lasting effect on African-Americans. This conflict developed because of mainstream America's inability to realize that the black community is not monolithic and African-Americans were differentially affected by slavery's legacy. It is those blacks who are most affected by the culture of poverty created by America's history of slavery who make up today's inner-city populations. Despite successes by the civil rights movement, problems within lower-class black communities continue because the issues of the black underclass have not yet been fully addressed.
Date: May 1995
Creator: Largent, Mark Aaron
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Persistence of Antebellum Planter Families in Postbellum East Texas (open access)

The Persistence of Antebellum Planter Families in Postbellum East Texas

The effect of the Civil War and Reconstruction on the southern planter elite remains a topic of interest to historians. Did the war ruin the planter class? Or, did they maintain economic, geographic, or social persistence? This study focuses on the persistence from 1850 to 1880 of five East Texas large planter families who owned one hundred or more slaves in 1860. An analysis of data primarily from county, state, and federal records formthe basis of this study. Four families persisted as wealthy influential members of their postbellum communities. One family remained geographically persistent but not wealthy. The experiences of these families suggest that large East Texas planter families found it possible to persist in spite of the Civil War and Reconstruction.
Date: May 1998
Creator: Newland, Linda Sue
System: The UNT Digital Library
André Malraux: the Anticolonial and Antifascist Years (open access)

André Malraux: the Anticolonial and Antifascist Years

This dissertation provides an explanation of how André Malraux, a man of great influence on twentieth century European culture, developed his political ideology, first as an anticolonial social reformer in the 1920s, then as an antifascist militant in the 1930s. Almost all of the previous studies of Malraux have focused on his literary life, and most of them are rife with errors. This dissertation focuses on the facts of his life, rather than on a fanciful recreation from his fiction. The major sources consulted are government documents, such as police reports and dispatches, the newspapers that Malraux founded with Paul Monin, other Indochinese and Parisian newspapers, and Malraux's speeches and interviews. Other sources include the memoirs of Clara Malraux, as well as other memoirs and reminiscences from people who knew Andre Malraux during the 1920s and the 1930s. The dissertation begins with a survey of Malraux's early years, followed by a detailed account of his experiences in Indochina. Then there is a survey of the period from 1926 to 1933, when Malraux won renown as a novelist and as a man with special insight into Asian affairs. The dissertation then focuses on Malraux's career as a militant antifascist during the …
Date: May 1996
Creator: Cruz, Richard A. (Richard Alan)
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Texas Presidencies : Presidential Leadership in the Republic of Texas, 1836-1845 (open access)

The Texas Presidencies : Presidential Leadership in the Republic of Texas, 1836-1845

This thesis examines the letters, proclamations, and addresses of the four presidents of the Republic of Texas, David G. Burnet, Sam Houston, Mirabeau B. Lamar, and Anson Jones, to determine how these men faced the major crises of Texas and shaped policy regarding land, relations with Native Americans, finances, internal improvements, annexation by the United States, and foreign relations. Research materials include manuscript and published speeches and letters, diaries, and secondary materials.
Date: May 1998
Creator: Bridges, Kenneth William
System: The UNT Digital Library
Jane McManus Storm Cazneau (1807-1878): A Biography (open access)

Jane McManus Storm Cazneau (1807-1878): A Biography

Jane Maria Eliza McManus, born near Troy, New York, educated at Emma Willard's Troy Female Seminary, promoted the American maritime frontier and wrote on Mexican, Central American, and Caribbean affairs. Called a "terror with her pen," under the pen name of Cora Montgomery, she published 100 columns in 6 newspapers, 20 journal articles and book reviews, 15 books and pamphlets, and edited 5 newspapers and journals between 1839 and 1878.
Date: May 1999
Creator: Hudson, Linda Sybert
System: The UNT Digital Library
US-Japan Relations during the Korean War (open access)

US-Japan Relations during the Korean War

During the Korean War, US-Japan relations changed dramatically from the occupation status into one of a security partnership in Asia. When North Korea invaded South Korea, Washington perceived Japan as the ultimate target. Washington immediately intervened in the Korean peninsula to protect the South on behalf of Japanese security. Japanese security was the most important objective of American policy regarding the Korean War, a reality to which historians have not given legitimate attention. While fighting in Korea, Washington decided to conclude an early peace treaty with Japan to initiate Japanese rearmament. The issue of Japanese rearmament was a focal point in the Japanese peace negotiation. Washington pressed Japan to rearm rapidly, but Tokyo stubbornly opposed. Under pressure from Washington, the Japanese government established the National Police Reserve and had to expand its military forces during the war. When the Korean War ceased in July 1953, Japanese armed forces numbered about 180,000 men. The Korean War also brought a fundamental change to Japanese economic and diplomatic relations in Asia. With a trade embargo on China following the unexpected Chinese intervention in Korea, Washington wanted to forbid Sino-Japanese trade completely. In addition, Washington pressed Tokyo to recognize the Nationalist regime in Taiwan …
Date: May 1995
Creator: Kim, Nam G. (Nam Gyun)
System: The UNT Digital Library
"These Whigs are Singing Songs Again!" Whig Songs as Campaign Literature Prior to the 1844 Presidential Race (open access)

"These Whigs are Singing Songs Again!" Whig Songs as Campaign Literature Prior to the 1844 Presidential Race

Whig campaign strategists in the presidential election of 1840 developed new campaign tactics that included widespread use of campaign songs. They used these songs to sing the praises of their own candidate and policies while at the same time attacking the opposing party's candidate and policies. As early as 1842 these songwriters began writing songs in anticipation of the campaign in 1844. Prior to the nomination of candidates in May, 1844, the Whigs had published several songbooks including hundreds of song titles. In addition to supporting the candidacy of Henry Clay as the Whig candidate, the songs ridiculed several potential Democratic candidates including Martin Van Buren, John C. Calhoun, James Buchanan, and others. Whigs also used imagery to support their candidate and attack the foe. Despite extensive efforts to influence the election with campaign songs, no hard evidence exists that documents the effect of campaign songs, either positively or negatively.
Date: May 1998
Creator: Page, James A. (James Allen), 1946-
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Political and Congressional Career of John Hancock, 1865-1885 (open access)

The Political and Congressional Career of John Hancock, 1865-1885

John Hancock was a Texas Unionist. After the Civil War, he became an opponent of the Radical Republicans. He was elected to Congress in 1871 and had some success working on issues important to Texas. As the state was redeemed from Radical Republican rule, Hancock was increasingly attacked for his Unionism. This led to a tough fight for renomination in 1874, and losses in races for the U.S. Senate and renomination in 1876. He was an unsuccessful congressional candidate in 1878, but was elected again in 1882. By then his political influence had waned and he did not seek renomination in 1884. Hancock had the potential to be a major political leader, but lingering resentment to his Unionism hampered his political career.
Date: May 1996
Creator: Hancock, W. Daniel
System: The UNT Digital Library
Behold the Fields: Texas Baptists and the Problem of Slavery (open access)

Behold the Fields: Texas Baptists and the Problem of Slavery

The relationship between Texas Baptists and slavery is studied with an emphasis on the official statements made about the institution in denominational sources combined with a statistical analysis of the extent of slaveholding among Baptists. A data list of over 5,000 names was pared to 1100 names of Baptists in Texas prior to 1865 and then cross-referenced on slaveownership through the use of federal censuses and county tax rolls. Although Texas Baptists participated economically in the slave system, they always maintained that blacks were children of God worthy of religious instruction and salvation. The result of these disparate views was a paradox between treating slaves as chattels while welcoming them into mixed congregations and allowing them some measure of activity within those bodies. Attitudes expressed by white Baptists during the antebellum period were continued into the post-war years as well. Meanwhile, African-American Baptists gradually withdrew from white dominated congregations, forming their own local, regional, and state organizations. In the end, whites had no choice but to accept the new-found status of the Freedmen, cooperating with black institutions on occasion. Major sources for this study include church, associational, and state Baptist minutes; county and denominational histories; and government documents. The four …
Date: May 1993
Creator: Elam, Richard L. (Richard Lee)
System: The UNT Digital Library
Owen Glendower and the Welsh Fight for Independence (open access)

Owen Glendower and the Welsh Fight for Independence

Owen Glendower led the last military struggle of the Welsh against the English crown for Welsh independence and nationalism. The failure of the Glendower rebellion established the supremacy of English rule over Wales. For six hundred years the status of Wales as a principality of the crown has not been seriously challenged. This paper will show how widespread the idea of "Welshness" was in 1400 and how much support existed for Wales as an independent nation. Welshmen sought to move from the status of a medieval, tribal principality to a position of an independent nation capable and ready to stand with other national in the world. The role of leadership that Owen Glendower assumed in the final rebellion against the English king, Henry IV, lifted him from a popular Welsh prince to an historical legend.
Date: May 1991
Creator: Beims, Phillip Eric
System: The UNT Digital Library
George Washington's Development as an Espionage Chief (open access)

George Washington's Development as an Espionage Chief

The American Revolution was a war of movement over great distances. Timely intelligence regarding the strength and location of the enemy was vital to the commanders on both sides. Washington gained his early experience in intelligence gathering in the wilderness during the French and Indian War. By the end of the American Revolution, Washington had become a skilled manager of intelligence. He sent agents behind enemy lines, recruited tory intelligence sources, questioned travelers for information, and initiated numerous espionage missions. Many heroic patriots gathered the intelligence that helped win the War for Independence. Their duties required many of them to pose as one of the enemy, and often incur the hatred of friends and neighbors. Some gave their lives in helping to establish the new American nation. It is possible that without Washington's intelligence service, American independence might not have been won.
Date: May 1993
Creator: Ritchey, David (David Benjamin
System: The UNT Digital Library