Friday March 6, 2026

Join us in the Exhibit Hall for Handbook of Texas Workshop Llight snacks and a cash bar will be available.

Session Chair: Carlos Varela, Texas General Land Office Presentation I: A Young Priest on the Texas Frontier: Father Pedro Fuentes in San Antonio, 1771–1790 Jesús F. de la Teja Father Pedro Fuentes, a native of Saltillo, served as pastor of San Fernando parish in San Antonio for nearly two decades during the Spanish colonial era—the

Mapping Chinatown: New Perspectives on Chinese Texas brings together emerging and established scholars who reexamine Chinese diasporic life in Texas and the broader U.S. through innovative methodologies spanning cultural studies, public history, and transnational analysis. Dr. Melody Yunzi Li (University of Houston) introduces the Mapping Houston’s Old Chinatown digital humanities project, which reconstructs the city’s

Horse racing has long captured the Texas imagination, linking the state’s frontier heritage to its modern entertainment industry. In this session, two presenters chart the history of Texas horse racing across two centuries. Dr. Anne J. Bailey examines the nineteenth-century “Golden Age” of Texas racing, when settlers from the United States formalized local sprint and

Chaired by Jasmine S. Wynton, President-Elect/President of the Texas Supreme Court Historical Society and Partner at Thompson Coburn, L.L.P., this session begins with Law in the Villa de San Felipe de Austin by Bryan McAuley. McAuley explores the operations of the alcalde court system in the 1820s and 30s, when San Felipe served as the

Cattle drives were among the most powerful engines of economic development and cultural identity in nineteenth-century frontier societies. This session explores the enduring legacy of overland cattle movement through both a deeply rooted Texas biography and a broader transnational comparison. The session begins with the remarkable life of Amanda Burks, an innovative Texas ranch woman

This session brings together two presentations that reveal how religion, science, and culture have intertwined across Texas and northern Mexico to shape the region’s intellectual and spiritual landscapes. In “The Gods of Big Bend National Park,” Adam T. Hogan (Texas Tech University) investigates how Big Bend’s physical and cultural terrain has long served as sacred

Texans in Civil War Indian Territory brings together scholars and historians to examine how Texans influenced and participated in the struggle for control of Indian Territory during the Civil War. W. Dale Weeks (Blinn College) investigates the role of North Texans in the creation of Confederate Indian policy, arguing that local actors—not just Confederate officials

Chaired by Justice Ken Wise, this session includes Governor Oran Roberts: From Secession to the University of Texas, in which John Adams explores the career of Oran Roberts, a staunch states’ rights advocate who guided Texas into secession, served in the Confederate army, and later became governor. His tenure emphasized fiscal responsibility and a commitment

This session explores the groundbreaking contributions of Texas women in aviation—from early trailblazers to modern leaders preserving their legacy. Together, the presentations highlight stories of courage, innovation, and resilience that shaped both the state’s history and national progress in aviation and gender equity. Dr. Robert W. Tidwell, II, examines the life of Edith Whatley McKanna,

The historical archeologist Ivor Noël Hume once remarked that archeology was “the handmaiden to history,” often used merely to confirm the written record. The presenters in Beneath Our Boots argue otherwise. This session offers four case studies that illustrate how archeology provides its own essential perspective on Texas’s past—one that expands and sometimes complicates the

The 1936 Texas Centennial marked a defining moment in the state’s efforts to celebrate and codify its history. This session brings together three perspectives on how Texans remembered and represented their past during that transformative decade. Jason P. Theriot traces the rediscovery of the long-lost Texas Declaration of Independence by Secretary of State Jane McCallum

The Wild Country: Mesteñas and Fighting Bulls in Mexico and Texas brings together two original studies that reveal how the movement, behavior, and mythology of animals shaped the history and identity of the borderlands. In “Breaking Free: The Origins of the Borderlands’ Wild Horses and Cows,” José Roberto Campos Cordero (University of Texas at Austin)