The Anglo-Iraqi Relationship Between 1945 and 1948. (open access)

The Anglo-Iraqi Relationship Between 1945 and 1948.

This paper discuses the British Labour government's social, economic and military policies in Iraq between 1945 and 1948. The ability of the Iraqi monarchy to adapt to the British policies after World War II is discussed. The British were trying to put more social justice into the Iraqi regime in order to keep British influence and to increase the Iraqi regime's stability against the Arab nationalist movement.
Date: December 2008
Creator: Alburaas, Theyab M.
System: The UNT Digital Library
The War for Peace: George H. W. Bush and Palestine, 1989-1992 (open access)

The War for Peace: George H. W. Bush and Palestine, 1989-1992

The administration of President George H. W. Bush from 1989 to 1992 saw several firsts in both American foreign policy towards the Middle East, and in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. At the beginning of the Bush Presidency, the intifada was raging in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and by the time it was over negotiations were already in progress for the most comprehensive agreement brokered in the history of the conflict to that point, the Oslo Accords. This paper will serve two purposes. First, it will delineate the relationships between the players in the Middle East and President Bush during the first year of his presidency. It will also explore his foreign policy towards the Middle East, and argue that it was the efforts of George H. W. Bush, and his diplomatic team that enabled the signing of the historic agreement at Oslo.
Date: August 2009
Creator: Arduengo, Enrique Sebastian
System: The UNT Digital Library
Combat Reconsidered: A Statistical Analysis of Small-Unit Actions During the American Civil War (open access)

Combat Reconsidered: A Statistical Analysis of Small-Unit Actions During the American Civil War

Historians often emphasize the physical features of battleterrain, weaponry, troop formations, earthworks, etc.in assessments of Civil War combat. Most scholars agree that these external combat conditions strongly influenced battle performance. Other historians accentuate the ways in which the mental stresses of soldiering affected combat performance. These scholars tend to agree that fighting effectiveness was influenced by such non-physical combat conditions as unit cohesion, leadership, morale, and emotional stress. Few authors argue that combat's mental influences were more significant in determining success or failure than the physical features of the battlefield. Statistical analysis of the 465 tactical engagements fought by twenty-seven Federal regiments in the First Division of the Army of the Potomac's Second Corps throughout the American Civil War suggests that the mental aspects of battle affected fighting efficiency at least as muchand probably more thancombat's physical characteristics. In other words, the soldiers' attitudes, opinions, and emotions had a somewhat stronger impact on combat performance than their actions, positions, and weaponry.
Date: December 2001
Creator: Barloon, Mark C.
System: The UNT Digital Library
A Stranger Amongst Strangers: An Analysis of the Freedmen's Bureau Subassistant Commissioners in Texas, 1865-1868 (open access)

A Stranger Amongst Strangers: An Analysis of the Freedmen's Bureau Subassistant Commissioners in Texas, 1865-1868

This dissertation is a study of the subassistant commissioners of the Freedmen's Bureau in Texas from late 1865 to late 1868. Its focus is two-fold. It first examines who these men were. Were they northern born or southern? Did they own slaves? Were these men rich, poor, or from the middle-class? Did they have military experience or were they civilians? How old was the average subassistant commissioner in Texas? This work will answer what man Freedmen's Bureau officials deemed qualified to transition the former slave from bondage to freedom. Secondly, in conjunction with these questions, this work will examine the day-to-day operations of the Bureau agents in Texas, chronicling those aspects endemic to all agents as well as those unique to certain subdistricts. The demand of being a Bureau agent was immense, requiring long hours in the office fielding questions and long hours in the saddle inspecting subdistricts. In essence, their work advising, protecting, and educating the freedmen was a never ending one. The records of the Freedmen's Bureau, both the records for headquarters and the subassistant commissioners, serve as the main sources, but numerous newspapers, Texas state official correspondences, and military records proved helpful. Immense amounts of information arrived …
Date: August 2008
Creator: Bean, Christopher B.
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Administration of Spain Under Charles V, Spain's New Charlemagne (open access)

The Administration of Spain Under Charles V, Spain's New Charlemagne

Charles I, King of Spain, or Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, was the most powerful ruler in Europe since Charlemagne. With a Germanic background, and speaking French, Charles became King of Spain in 1516. Yet secondary sources and available sixteenth century Spanish sources such as Spanish Royal Council records, local records of Castro Urdiales in Castile, and Charles's correspondence show that he continued the policies of his predecessors in Spain, Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile. He strove to strengthen his power and unify Spain and his empire using Castilian strength, a Castilian model of government, Roman law, religion, his strong personality, and a loyal and talented bureaucracy. Charles desired to be another Charlemagne, but with his base of power in Spain.
Date: May 2005
Creator: Beard, Joseph
System: The UNT Digital Library
Negotiating Interests: Elizabeth Montagu's Political Collaborations with Edward Montagu; George, Lord Lyttelton; and William Pulteney, Lord Bath (open access)

Negotiating Interests: Elizabeth Montagu's Political Collaborations with Edward Montagu; George, Lord Lyttelton; and William Pulteney, Lord Bath

This dissertation examines Elizabeth Robinson Montagu's relationships with three men: her husband, Edward Montagu; George Lyttelton, first baron Lyttelton; and William Pulteney, earl of Bath to show how these relationships were structured and how Elizabeth Montagu negotiated them in order to forward her own intellectual interests. Montagu's relationship with her husband Edward and her friendships with Lord Lyttelton and Lord Bath supplied her with important outlets for intellectual and political expression. Scholarly work on Montagu's friendships with other intellectual women has demonstrated how Montagu drew on the support of female friends in her literary ambitions, but at the same time, it has obscured her equally important male relationships. Without discounting the importance of female friendship to Montagu's intellectual life, this study demonstrates that Montagu's relationships with Bath, Lyttleton, and her husband were at least as important to her as those with women, and that her male friendships and relationships offered her entry into the political sphere. Elizabeth Montagu was greatly interested in the political debates of her day and she contributed to the political process in the various ways open to her as an elite woman and female intellectual. Within the context of these male friendships, Montagu had an opportunity …
Date: December 2009
Creator: Bennett, Elizabeth Stearns
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Twilight of the Texas Democrats: The 1978 Governor's Race (open access)

The Twilight of the Texas Democrats: The 1978 Governor's Race

This dissertation examines the results and strategies used in the 1978 Texas gubernatorial election to determine what issues, demographics, and campaign strategies led the Republican Party nominee, Dallas businessman Bill Clements, to defeat the Democratic nominee, Attorney General John Hill, to break the 105-year old Democratic lock on the governorship and how this victory affected the evolution of Texas into a two-party state. Research materials include manuscripts and published speeches, letters, oral interviews, elections results, and secondary materials.
Date: December 2003
Creator: Bridges, Kenneth William
System: The UNT Digital Library
Got Silk?: Buying, Selling, and Advertising British Luxury Imports During the Stamp Act Crisis (open access)

Got Silk?: Buying, Selling, and Advertising British Luxury Imports During the Stamp Act Crisis

Despite the amount of scholarship on the Stamp Act Crisis, no study has used advertisements as a main source. This study attempts to show that a valuable, objective source has been overlooked, through the quantitative analysis of 5,810 advertisements before, during and after the Stamp Act Crisis from five port cities: Boston, Charleston, Philadelphia, New York, and Portsmouth. The findings reveal the colonists' strong connection to imported British luxury goods, and a lack of interest in American-made goods, especially before and after the boycott. Advertisements also demonstrate that the decision of many merchants to place the needs and expectations of their community before their own personal gain offered a rare economic opportunity for others. The colonists' devotion to imports tested the strength of the boycott, especially among Boston merchants, who continued to advertise imported goods a good deal more than any other city. This lack of dedication to the boycott on the part of the Boston merchants shows disunity among the colonies, at a time when many argue was the first instance of colonial nationalism. Capitalism challenged and undermined a commitment to communal sentiments such as nationalism. Moreover, if Americans did share a sense of nationhood during the Stamp Act …
Date: August 2007
Creator: Busse, Michele Conrady
System: The UNT Digital Library
Gladstone and the Bank of England: A Study in Mid-Victorian Finance, 1833-1866 (open access)

Gladstone and the Bank of England: A Study in Mid-Victorian Finance, 1833-1866

The topic of this thesis is the confrontations between William Gladstone and the Bank of England. These confrontations have remained a mystery to authors who noted them, but have generally been ignored by others. This thesis demonstrates that Gladstone's measures taken against the Bank were reasonable, intelligent, and important for the development of nineteenth-century British government finance. To accomplish this task, this thesis refutes the opinions of three twentieth-century authors who have claimed that many of Gladstone's measures, as well as his reading, were irrational, ridiculous, and impolitic. My primary sources include the Gladstone Diaries, with special attention to a little-used source, Volume 14, the indexes to the Diaries. The day-to-day Diaries and the indexes show how much Gladstone read about financial matters, and suggest that his actions were based to a large extent upon his reading. In addition, I have used Hansard's Parliamentary Debates and nineteenth-century periodicals and books on banking and finance to understand the political and economic debates of the time.
Date: May 2007
Creator: Caernarven-Smith, Patricia
System: The UNT Digital Library
Spanish Relations with the Apache Nations East of the Río Grande (open access)

Spanish Relations with the Apache Nations East of the Río Grande

This dissertation is a study of the Eastern Apache nations and their struggle to survive with their culture intact against numerous enemies intent on destroying them. It is a synthesis of published secondary and primary materials, supported with archival materials, primarily from the Béxar Archives. The Apaches living on the plains have suffered from a lack of a good comprehensive study, even though they played an important role in hindering Spanish expansion in the American Southwest. When the Spanish first encountered the Apaches they were living peacefully on the plains, although they occasionally raided nearby tribes. When the Spanish began settling in the Southwest they changed the dynamics of the region by introducing horses. The Apaches quickly adopted the animals into their culture and used them to dominate their neighbors. Apache power declined in the eighteenth century when their Caddoan enemies acquired guns from the French, and the powerful Comanches gained access to horses and began invading northern Apache territory. Surrounded by enemies, the Apaches increasingly turned to the Spanish for aid and protection rather than trade. The Spanish-Apache peace was fraught with problems. The Spaniards tended to lump all Apaches into one group even though, in reality, each band …
Date: May 2001
Creator: Carlisle, Jeffrey D.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Amon Carter: The Founder of Modern Fort Worth, 1930-1955 (open access)

Amon Carter: The Founder of Modern Fort Worth, 1930-1955

From 1930 to 1955, Amon Carter, publisher of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, exerted his power to create modern Fort Worth. Carter used his stature as the publisher of the city's major newspaper to build a modern city out of this livestock center. Between 1930 and 1955, Carter lobbied successfully for New Deal funds for Fort Worth, persuaded Consolidated Aircraft to build an airplane plant in the city, and convinced Burlington Railways to stay in the city. He also labored unsuccessfully to have the Trinity River Canal built and to secure a General Motors plant for Fort Worth. These efforts demonstrate that Carter was indeed the founder of modern Fort Worth.
Date: May 2005
Creator: Cervantez, Brian
System: The UNT Digital Library
What has Damascus to do with Paris? A Comparative Analysis of Ibn Taymiyya and Gregory of Rimini: A Fourteenth Century and Late Medieval Rejection of the Use of Aristotelian Logic in the Legitimization of Divine Revelation in the Christian and Islamic Traditions (open access)

What has Damascus to do with Paris? A Comparative Analysis of Ibn Taymiyya and Gregory of Rimini: A Fourteenth Century and Late Medieval Rejection of the Use of Aristotelian Logic in the Legitimization of Divine Revelation in the Christian and Islamic Traditions

This thesis is a comparative analysis of Ibn Taymiyya of Damascus and Gregory of Rimini within their respective religious and philosophical traditions. Ibn Taymiyya and Gregory of Rimini rejected the use of Aristotelian logic in the valorization of divine revelation in Islam and Christianity respectively. The translation movements, in Baghdad and then in Toledo, ensured the transmission of Greek scientific and philosophical works to both the Islamic world during the 'Abbasid Caliphate and the Catholic Christian European milieu beginning in the eleventh century. By the fourteenth century both the Islamic and the Catholic European religious traditions had a long history of assimilating Aristotle's Organon. Ibn Taymiyya and Gregory of Rimini rejected the notion, adopted by the kalam and scholastic traditions respectively, that logical demonstration could be used to validate religious doctrine as taught in the Qur'an and the Bible. Ibn Taymiyya rejected demonstration completely but Gregory accepted its qualified use.
Date: December 2009
Creator: Chelvan, Richard D.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Robert Boyle and the Significance of Skill and Experience in Seventeenth-Century Natural Philosophy (open access)

Robert Boyle and the Significance of Skill and Experience in Seventeenth-Century Natural Philosophy

The purpose of this study is to examine how English natural philosophers of the seventeenth century—in particular, Robert Boyle (1627-1691) considered and assessed the personal traits of skill and experience and the significance of these characteristics to the practice of seventeenth-century science. Boyle's writings reveal that skill and experience impacted various aspects of his seventeenth-century experimental natural philosophy, including the credibility assessment of tradesmen and eyewitnesses to natural phenomena, the contingencies involved in the making of experiments, and Boyle's statements about the requisite skills of experimental philosophy in contrast to other traditions. Subtopics explored include the popularization of science and Boyle's expectations concerning the future improvement of natural philosophy.
Date: August 2000
Creator: Chipman, Gary V.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Educational Opportunities Available for Women in Antebellum Texas (open access)

Educational Opportunities Available for Women in Antebellum Texas

The matter of formal education for women in the antebellum South raises many questions, especially for the frontier state of Texas. Were there schools for young women in antebellum Texas? If so, did these schools emphasize academic or ornamental subjects? Did only women from wealthy families attend? This study answered these questions by examining educational opportunities in five antebellum Texas counties. Utilizing newspapers, probate records, tax records, and the federal census, it identified schools for girls in all of the counties and found that those schools offered academic as well as ornamental subjects. Almost all of the girls who attended those schools came from privileged families. Schools were available for young women in antebellum Texas, but generally only those from wealthy families were able to attend.
Date: August 2006
Creator: Cochrane, Michelle L.
System: The UNT Digital Library
What Went Wrong?  How Arrogant Ignorance and Cultural Misconceptions Turned Deadly at the San Antonio Courthouse, March 19, 1840 (open access)

What Went Wrong? How Arrogant Ignorance and Cultural Misconceptions Turned Deadly at the San Antonio Courthouse, March 19, 1840

Although the Council House Fight is well written about in the annals of early Texas history, this all-encompassing study will reveal a whole new picture. Unlike previous works that maintained one point of view, multiple perspectives were analyzed and explored to allow a more comprehensive view of the Council House Fight to emerge. Primary focus on social and cultural misunderstandings, as well as the mounting hostility between the Penateka Comanche and Texians across the frontier, will demonstrate their general distrust and hatred of the other. Detailing their complicated relationship will prove that neither the Texians nor the Comanche were without blame, and both shared responsibility for the deterioration of events on and before March 19, 1840.
Date: May 2008
Creator: Copeland, Cristen Paige
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Impact of a Father and Son on Texas: Isaac Van Zandt and Khleber Miller Van Zandt (open access)

The Impact of a Father and Son on Texas: Isaac Van Zandt and Khleber Miller Van Zandt

Isaac Van Zandt and his son Khleber Miller Van Zandt were instrumental figures in the growth of Texas and the development of the town of Fort Worth, Texas. Isaac Van Zandt was one of the main members of the delegation from Texas to the United States who negotiated for annexation. He also played a major part in the Texas Constitutional Convention of 1845 and made a run for governor before his death in 1847. His son, Khleber Miller Van Zandt was a Confederate soldier and businessman who saw something in the outpost of Fort Worth that was worth developing. Along with an influential group of other businessmen he was a part of every major development that occurred in Fort Worth until his death in 1930. Both Van Zandts' roles are discussed and the importance of their actions is brought to light.
Date: December 2006
Creator: Cranz, Jane Sloan
System: The UNT Digital Library
Dem Schwerte Muss Der Pflug Folgen: Űber-Peasants and National Socialist Settlements in the Occupied Eastern Territories during World War Two (open access)

Dem Schwerte Muss Der Pflug Folgen: Űber-Peasants and National Socialist Settlements in the Occupied Eastern Territories during World War Two

German industrialization in the nineteenth century had brought forward a variety of conflicting ideas when it came to the agrarian community. One of them was the agrarian romantic movement led by Adam Műller, who feared the loss of the traditional German peasant. Műller influenced Reichdeutsche Richard Walther Darré, who argued that large cities were the downfall of the German people and that only a healthy peasant stock would be able to ‘save' Germany. Under Darré's definition, “Geopolitik” was the defense of the land, the defense with Pflug und Schwert (plow and sword) by Wehrbauern, an ‘Űberbauer-fusion' of soldier and peasant. In order to accomplish these goals, new settlements had to be established while moving from west to east. The specific focus of this study is on the original Hegewald resettlement ideas of Richard Walther Darré and how his philosophy was taken over by Himmler and fit into his personal needs and creed after 1941. It will shed some light on the interaction of Darré and Himmler and the notorious internal fights and power struggles between the various governmental agencies involved. The Ministry for Food and Agriculture under the leadership of Darré was systematically pushed into the background and all previous, …
Date: May 2007
Creator: De Santiago Ramos, Simone C.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Jewish Hidden Children in Belgium during the Holocaust: A Comparative Study of Their Hiding Places at Christian Establishments, Private Families, and Jewish Orphanages (open access)

Jewish Hidden Children in Belgium during the Holocaust: A Comparative Study of Their Hiding Places at Christian Establishments, Private Families, and Jewish Orphanages

This thesis compares the different trauma received at the three major hiding places for Jewish children in Belgium during the Holocaust: Christian establishments, private families, and Jewish orphanages. Jewish children hidden at Christian establishments received mainly religious trauma and nutritional, sanitary, and medical neglect. Hiding with private families caused separation trauma and extreme hiding situations. Children staying at Jewish orphanages lived with a continuous fear of being deported, because these institutions were under constant supervision of the German occupiers. No Jewish child survived their hiding experience without receiving some major trauma that would affect them for the rest of their life. This thesis is based on video interviews at Shoah Visual History Foundation and Blum Archives, as well as autobiographies published by hidden children.
Date: December 2006
Creator: Decoster, Charlotte
System: The UNT Digital Library
School Spirit or School Hate: The Confederate Battle Flag, Texas High Schools, and Memory, 1953-2002 (open access)

School Spirit or School Hate: The Confederate Battle Flag, Texas High Schools, and Memory, 1953-2002

The debate over the display of the Confederate battle flag in public places throughout the South focus on the flag's display by state governments such South Carolina and Mississippi. The state of Texas is rarely placed in this debate, and neither has the debate adequately explore the role of high schools' use of Confederate symbols. Schools represent the community and serve as a symbol of its values. A school represented by Confederate symbols can communicate a message of intolerance to a rival community or opposing school during sports contests. Within the community, conflict arose when an opposition group to the symbols formed and asked for the symbols' removal in favor of symbols that were seen more acceptable by outside observers. Many times, an outside party needed to step in to resolve the conflict. In Texas, the conflict between those in favor and those oppose centered on the Confederate battle flag, and the memory each side associated with the flag. Anglos saw the flag as their school spirit. African Americans saw hatred.
Date: December 2006
Creator: Dirickson, Perry
System: The UNT Digital Library
Public Opinion of Conscription in the Federal Republic of Germany, 1954-1956 (open access)

Public Opinion of Conscription in the Federal Republic of Germany, 1954-1956

In 1955, barely ten years after the end of the most devastating war in Modern German history, a new German military was established in the Federal Republic, the Bundeswehr. In order properly fill the ranks of this new military the government, under the leadership of Konrad Adenauer, believed that it would have to draft men from the West German population into military service. For the government in Bonn conscription was a double-edged sword, it would not only ensure that the Bundeswehr would receive the required number of recruits but it was also believed that conscription would guarantee that the Bundeswehr would be more democratic and therefore in tune with the policies of the new West German state. What this study seeks to explore is what the West German population thought of conscription. It will investigate who was for or against the draft and seek to determine the various socioeconomic factors that contributed to these decisions. Furthermore this study will examine the effect that the public opinion had on federal policy.
Date: May 2009
Creator: Donnelly, Jared
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Rise of a Two-Party State: A Case Study of Houston and Harris County, Texas, 1952-1962 (open access)

The Rise of a Two-Party State: A Case Study of Houston and Harris County, Texas, 1952-1962

This thesis discusses the rise of the Republican party in Texas and specifically Harris County. The time period is the decade between the Presidential election of Dwight D. Eisenhower and the campaign of Jack Cox for Governor. Changes in the structure and leadership of the Republican party at the state level and specific precincts are examined in detail in chapter one. Leaders in Houston during this time period, such as Jesse Jones, Roy Cullen, and Oveta Culp Hobby are discussed in chapter two. The elections of Eisenhower, Cox, and Republican John Tower are analyzed in chapter three. The conclusion finds six major factors for the political changes occurring in Harris County, including economic and demographic changes. Main sources for this work included the Harris County Democratic party records and the Jack Cox Papers at the Center for American History, the Eisenhower Library, and the John Tower Papers.
Date: December 2007
Creator: Dunbar, Crystal Rose
System: The UNT Digital Library
Germanic Women: Mundium and Property, 400-1000 (open access)

Germanic Women: Mundium and Property, 400-1000

Abstract Many historians would like to discover a time of relative freedom, security and independence for women of the past. The Germanic era, from 400-1000 AD, was a time of stability, and security due to limitations the law placed upon the mundwald and the legal ability of women to possess property. The system of compensations that the Germans initiated in an effort to stop the blood feuds between Germanic families, served as a deterrent to men that might physically or sexually abuse women. The majority of the sources used in this work were the Germanic Codes generally dated from 498-1024 AD. Ancient Roman and Germanic sources provide background information about the individual tribes. Secondary sources provide a contrast to the ideas of this thesis, and information.
Date: August 2006
Creator: Dunn, Kimberlee Harper
System: The UNT Digital Library
Clarence R. Huebner: An American Military Story of Achievement (open access)

Clarence R. Huebner: An American Military Story of Achievement

In the eyes of the American public excellence is often overshadowed by brilliance of personality. This is particularly true in the portrayal of many of the country's military leaders in World War II. A prime example of this phenomenon is Douglas MacArthur, whose larger than life persona made him a newspaper fixture during the war despite a series of strategic and tactical blunders that would have led to the sacking of a less visible (and publicly popular) leader. At the level of divisional commanders, this triumph of brilliance over excellence is best exemplified by the two primary leaders of the country's 1st Infantry Division, Terry de la Mesa Allen and Clarence R. Huebner. One was a hard-drinking, swashbuckling leader who led by almost the sheer force of his personality; the other, a plain spoken, demanding officer who believed that organization, planning and attention to detail were the keys to superior battlefield performance. The leadership differences between Allen and Huebner have been documented in multiple publications. What has not been documented is the life of the truly overshadowed general - Huebner. Huebner's transition to the leadership of the 1st Infantry Division (1st ID) constitute only a small period in a military …
Date: May 2006
Creator: Flaig, Steven
System: The UNT Digital Library
Spanish La Junta de los Rios: The institutional Hispanicization of an Indian community along New Spain's northern frontier, 1535-1821. (open access)

Spanish La Junta de los Rios: The institutional Hispanicization of an Indian community along New Spain's northern frontier, 1535-1821.

Throughout the colonial period, the Spanish attempted to Hispanicize the Indians along the northern frontier of New Spain. The conquistador, the missionary, the civilian settler, and the presidial soldier all took part in this effort. At La Junta de los Rios, a fertile area inhabited by both sedentary and semi-sedentary Indians, each of these institutions played a part in fundamentally changing the region and its occupants. This research, relying primarily on published Spanish source documents, sets the effort to Hispanicize La Junta in the broader sphere of Spain's frontier policy.
Date: August 2008
Creator: Folsom, Bradley
System: The UNT Digital Library