History Commons^™

“I Am Still Dakota”: Assimilation, Education, And Survival On The Lake Traverse Reservation, Katherine Victoria Kemp

Dissertations and Theses

In 1867, the Sisseton Wahpeton signed the Lake Traverse Treaty and settled on the Lake Traverse Reservation in Northeastern South Dakota. As part of the growing westward expansion of settlers, the U.S government confined Indigenous peoples to reservations and tried to destroy their culture. Federal and state governments since then have continued to eliminate, relocate, and assimilate Indigenous people. For Indigenous peoples, the land is life, and assimilation through boarding schools served to sever them from their land and enforce white superiority. In this thesis, I argue that the Sisseton Wahpeton found ways to engage in cultural resilience utilizing Indigenous …

"I Just Had To Do Most Everything": Gender, Settlement And American Empire In The Far West, Hannah Alexandra Reynolds

Dissertations and Theses

The field of settler colonial studies has made huge strides in recent years toward problematizing the establishment of the United States on stolen land and the nation's steady, violent expansion across the continent. Settler colonial framework provides a rich opportunity for historians of the American West to reframe white settlement on the frontier, especially that which was made possible through land grant legislation such as the Homestead Act of 1862. As the families who took up land grant property sought new opportunities for themselves, they also acted as drivers of U.S. territorial acquisition. This process was inherently gendered, in terms …

Eating Real Mexican: Identity, Authenticity, Americanization, Health, And Food Culture In The United States After 1900, Alexandra H. Ibarra

Dissertations and Theses

This thesis examines the connection between Mexican food and identity in the early to mid-twentieth century (1900-1950). Anglo-Americans created evolving racial/ethnic stereotypes during a period of intense Mexican immigration and nativism that used descriptions of food, hygiene habits, and health to reinforce boundaries of whiteness and citizenship.

By examining Americanization teaching manuals, food articles, as well as personal and corporate cookbooks, I seek to understand how Americanizers and other food writers used food to point to emphasize, unhygienic habits, excess use of spice and grease, as well as the "questionable" nature of immigrate food culture to separate them from Anglo-Americans. …

Letitia Carson In Court: African American Women, Property, And Wages In The Pacific Northwest, Stephanie Marie Vallance

Dissertations and Theses

Letitia Carson arrived in Oregon from Missouri in 1845, accompanied by David Carson and their newborn child, a daughter named Martha. The Carsons settled in the Soap Creek Valley and took advantage of Oregon's Provisional Government's donation land claim program, living on 640 acres in the newly formed Benton County with Martha and a second child, a son named Adam, born a few years after arriving in Oregon. Within ten years, however, David would be dead and Letitia would be dispossessed of all property and belongings. A former slave, Letitia had little social standing in the new territory and no …

Regionalist Romance: "America Eats" And The Culinary Myth-Making Of The Federal Writers' Project, Icarus J. Smith

Dissertations and Theses

This thesis expands upon food historian Camille Bégin's assertion that the "America Eats" manuscript of the New Deal's Federal Writers' Project was "in tune with the interwar revival of regionalism" in the United States. Using archival material associated with the project and regionalist literature of the period, this study explores the dichotomies inherent in the broader regionalist movement of the Depression Era -- particularly using the project's treatment of the American West. Using foodways as the topic and regionalism as the intellectual framework, the FWP employees sought to document what they believed was the authentic culinary character of the nation …

Finding A Community Niche: Rethinking Historic House Museums In Oregon, Liza Julene Schade

Dissertations and Theses

This thesis discusses current preservation and public history in the field of historic house museums in Oregon, looking at two case studies that are undergoing processes of reinterpretation. The first chapter provides a brief history of heritage preservation in the United States, describes the spectrum of historic homes, and presents a key framework of four factors that need to be addressed when evaluating sites today. Current methodology refers to reinterpretation of sites to be more diverse, working with collections, doing research and restaging, along with innovating new programs. Public access and engagement pertain to finding a unique niche in the …

Battle Rock: Anatomy Of A Massacre, Adam R. Fitzhugh

Dissertations and Theses

On June 9, 1851, nine men under the direction of a steamboat captain and land speculator named William Tichenor landed on the southern coast of the Oregon Territory at present-day Port Orford with the intention of establishing a permanent settlement. Tichenor's plan was to establish a commercial port that would supply gold mining endeavors in the interior. The landing party's instructions were to survey the townsite while Tichenor traveled to San Francisco to gather more men and supplies. Before departing, he promised the group he would return in exactly two weeks. He also assured them that the local Quatomah Indians, …

Judicial Review As An Instrument Of Natural Rights Theory: An Intellectual History, James M. Masnov

Dissertations and Theses

The unique and antidemocratic power of judicial review by the United States Supreme Court is not a bug, but a feature. Its role was critical in establishing and affirming a separation of powers horizontally among the federal branches as well as vertically between the federal government and the individual states. More than this, the Court's power of judicial review acts as an instrument of rights theory and is informed by a rich and rarely-discussed intellectual history. Though judicial review as a mode of constitutional law and the legal history surrounding it has been discussed by various legal scholars, political scientists, …

Oregon's Racial Purity Regime: The Influence Of International Scientific Racism On Law Enforcement, Legislation, Public Health, And Incarceration In Portland, Oregon During The Victorian And Progressive Eras (1851-1917), Katherine N. Bush

Dissertations and Theses

In 1983, the Oregon State legislature repealed the eugenic sterilization law that had been in use for 60 years. Initially passed during the Progressive era, this law epitomized the State's legacy of surveilling, policing, caging, and inflicting brutality on marginalized and racialized communities who were deemed dangerous, threatening, or contagious. Public health leaders, political officials, law enforcement authorities, and private charities worked together as a multivalent system to maintain racial purity in the State. This racial purity regime drew upon a legacy of international pseudo-scientific racism to justify and bolster policies, legislation, and practices that targeted impoverished communities, people of …

Henry Adams: An Education In Autobiography, Marcellus Richie

Dissertations and Theses

This essay will begin by breaking down Henry Adams’s starting sentence in his autobiography word by word, piece by piece – pondering its meanings and permutations in the context of subsequent chapters of this iconic memoir. The essay will then consider whether Adams’s Education should still be regarded as a classic of American autobiography or seen merely as an irrelevant and out-of-date artifact. In a nation radically transformed since Adams’s time, does the book still deserve its high flung reputation? In other words, which of the images cited above is most relevant to The Education: an image of optimistic youth …

The Space Between “Seen” And “Unseen:” Queer People And The 1915-1945 New Negro Renaissance, Claudia R. Campanella

Dissertations and Theses

In November 1926, a group of Black artists, writers, and activists created the first and only edition of Fire!!, edited by novelist Wallace Thurman. Fire!! was created by a younger generation of New Negroes and “devoted to the younger Negro artists” who dissented from the mainstream ideas of the New Negro Movement and used the magazine to spread their own views on the 1915-1945 New Negro Renaissance. Fire!! and other texts speaking to this dissent against a Black intellectual middle class image of the movement will be studied in reference to showcasing the multi-faceted elements of the movement touching …

Settler Colonial Curriculum In Carlisle Boarding School: A Historical And Personal Qualitative Research Study, Patrick Gerard Eagle Staff

Dissertations and Theses

This dissertation research study brings together a historical account and one scholar's personal and family stories of how Indigenous children were stolen and sent to the first Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) boarding schools and tribal schools. In the case of the researcher's family, the educational experiences at Carlisle Indian Industrial School immediately started a traumatic assimilation process on Indigenous children that instilled generational trauma for them and their descendants. At these schools, Indigenous children were forced to conform to a foreign European school designed to abolish their Indigenous identity that demanded they give up their language and culture to …

In Controversy Oft: James David Bales And The Sharp Decline Of The Apocalyptic Worldview At Harding University, Cory Spruiell

Dissertations and Theses

No abstract provided.

"All Things To All Men": The Life And Work Of Monsignor Thomas J. Tobin, Priest Of The Archdiocese Of Portland In Oregon, Samuel Richard Mertz

Dissertations and Theses

This thesis is a biographical study of the life and work of Monsignor Thomas J. Tobin, a priest of the Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon. It covers his leadership in the labor movement during World War II, his participation in the Liturgical Movement, and his efforts to bring the Catholic Church in Oregon into ecumenical dialogue with other Christians. It culminates in his involvement in the Second Vatican Council. His activism can only be truly understood within the context of Oregon's vibrant progressive movement, a movement that carried disproportionate influence in a state that was in many ways politically conservative …

New Directions For Kabuki Performances In America In The 21st Century, Narumi Iwasaki

Dissertations and Theses

Transitions from the first kabuki performance abroad in Russia in 1928 to the recent performances around the world show various changes in the purpose and production of kabuki performances overseas. Kabuki has been performed as a Japanese traditional art in the U.S. for about 60 years, and the United States has seen more kabuki than any other country outside of Japan. Those tours were closely tied to national cultural policy of both Japan and the USA in the early years. The first kabuki tour to New York in 1960 helped to reestablish the U.S-Japan relationship after the war.

However, recently …

"Beneath This Sod": Intersections Of Colonialism, Urbanization, And Memory In The Cemeteries Of Salem And Portland, Oregon, Kirsten Makenna Straus

Dissertations and Theses

Despite the large amount of research about the colonization of the American West Coast, historians have overlooked the subtle yet significant role that cemeteries have played in this narrative. Using evidence from archives, newspapers, and historical maps, this study identifies the forces which influenced the development and use of cemeteries in Portland and Salem, Oregon during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In Salem, the reinterpretation of the story of Methodist Mission leader Jason Lee culminated in an elaborate reinterment ceremony nearly sixty years after his death at the cemetery he had helped found. By contrast, the remains of Indigenous children …

"Excellent Propaganda" Zbigniew Brzezinski's Narrative For The Soviet Invasion Of Afghanistan, Matt Mulhern

Dissertations and Theses

My focus is Cold War, and my thesis is about Zbigniew Brzezinski's larger geopolitical vision and objectivesforthePersian Gulf region, including how he used the Afghan war to pursue those objectives, and how important his willful misunderstanding of Soviet intentions in Afghanistan was to the legacy of America’s involvement in that nation’s affairs.

A Mutual Charge: The Shared Mission Of Herbert Hoover And Harry S. Truman To Alleviate Global Hunger In A Postwar World, Brian Douglas Reese

Dissertations and Theses

Famine and destitution stemming from the Second World War had spread across the European continent and parts of Asia by mid-1945. Recognizing the need for recovery and survival in those regions, President Harry S. Truman at the recommendation of several Cabinet members, summoned ex-President Herbert Hoover for advice on how the United States should proceed in offering aid beyond the earlier efforts of the United Nations Rehabilitation and Relief Administration and other relief sources. After an absence from the White House and official government participation for many years, Hoover readily provided crucial advice on addressing famine relief in Europe and …

Anarchism On The Willamette: The Firebrand Newspaper And The Origins Of A Culturally American Anarchist Movement, 1895-1898, Alecia Jay Giombolini

Dissertations and Theses

The Firebrand was an anarchist communist newspaper that was printed in Portland, Oregon from January 1895 to September 1897. The newspaper was a central catalyst behind the formation of the culturally American anarchist movement, a movement whose vital role in shaping radicalism in the United States during the Progressive Era has largely been ignored by historians. The central argument of this thesis is that the Firebrand publishers' experiences in Gilded Age Portland shaped the content and the format of the newspaper and led to the development of a new, uniquely American expression of anarchism.

Anarchism was developed in response to …

A Temperate And Wholesome Beverage: The Defense Of The American Beer Industry, 1880-1920, Lyndsay Danielle Smith

Dissertations and Theses

For decades prior to National Prohibition, the "liquor question" received attention from various temperance, prohibition, and liquor interest groups. Between 1880 and 1920, these groups gained public interest in their own way. The liquor interests defended their industries against politicians, religious leaders, and social reformers, but ultimately failed. While current historical scholarship links the different liquor industries together, the beer industry constantly worked to distinguish itself from other alcoholic beverages.

To counter threats from anti-alcohol groups, beer industry advocates presented their drink as a wholesome, pure, socially and culturally rich, and economically significant beverage that stood apart from other alcoholic …

"On The Murder Of Rickey Johnson": The Portland Police Bureau, Deadly Force, And The Struggle For Civil Rights In Oregon, 1940 - 1975, Katherine Eileen Nelson

Dissertations and Theses

On March 14, 1975, twenty-eight year old Portland Police Officer Kenneth Sanford shot and killed seventeen-year-old Rickie Charles Johnson in the back of the head during a sting operation. Incredulously, Johnson was the fourth person of color to be shot and killed by Portland police within a five-month period. Due to his age and surrounding circumstances, Johnson's death by Sanford elicited extreme reactions from varied communities of Portland. Unlike previous deaths of people of color by the police in Portland, Johnson's death received widespread attention from mainstream media outlets. In response, some white citizens decried Johnson's death as unjustified police …

Evangelical Dictatorship Driving The Guatemalan Civil War: Reconsidering Ríos Montt, The “Savior Of La Nueva Guatemala”, Miho Egoshi

Dissertations and Theses

The devastating earthquake that hit Guatemala in 1976 was used as a pretext for American born Protestant evangelicalism—mainly Pentecostalism—to gain entry in the Guatemalan society. A major consequence of the earthquake relief efforts by American evangelicals, is that their meddling also intensified the Mayan genocide during the Guatemalan Civil War (1960-96). This thesis explores the complicit relationship of religion and politics in the Guatemalan Civil War, focusing on the evangelical dictator Efraín Ríos Montt’s regime (1982-83). Firstly, it examines how Christian evangelicalism played a pivotal role for conservative Republican candidate Ronald Reagan and, later through his administration, for Ríos Montt’s …

The Spring Street Church In The Age Of Abolition, David S. Pultz

Dissertations and Theses

This study profiles the Spring Street Presbyterian Church in antebellum New York City as an integrated congregation active in the local abolitionist movement. It is framed against the rapid economic and social changes taking place within New York and the immediate neighborhood of the Eighth Ward during the early 19th century. Research focuses on religious antislavery during the Second Great Awakening and the place occupied by the Spring Street congregation as led by three of its antislavery pastors: Samuel H. Cox (1820-1825), Henry G. Ludlow, (1828-1837), and William Patton, (1837-1847). The study argues that Spring Street was a uniquely activist …

Music And Race In The American West, William Steven Schneider

Dissertations and Theses

This thesis explores the complexities of race relations in the nineteenth century American West. The groups considered here are African Americans, Anglo Americans, Chinese, Mexican Americans, and Native Americans. In recent decades historians of the West have begun to tell the narratives of racial minorities. This study adopts the aims of these scholars through a new lens--music. Ultimately, this thesis argues that historians can use music, both individual songs and broader conceptions about music, to understand the complex and contradictory race relations of the nineteenth century west.

Proceeding thematically, the first chapter explores the ways Anglo Americans used music to …

Charles A. Moose: Race, Community Policing, And Portland's First African American Police Chief, Douglas Jon Kenck-Crispin

Dissertations and Theses

In 1993, Charles Moose became Portland, Oregon's first black police chief. A nationally recognized student of the developing theories of community policing, Chief Moose's promotion was also hoped to help strengthen the diversity of the Portland Police Bureau. Ultimately, Portlanders were unable to look past Moose's public outbursts and demeanor and recognize his accomplishments. As a city, they missed an opportunity.

This thesis uses transcripts of speeches and policy papers to present some political history to the reader, but also letters to the mayor's office, letters to the editor and the like to consider the social history of 1990's Portland. …

Hidden History: The Role Of Great Britain In The American Civil War As Told By Cultural Artifacts, Mary Griffiths

Dissertations and Theses

What do statues and songs tell us about the Civil War? If the monuments are in the United States – a marker on a battlefield for instance- it is easy to decipher the context and historical significance. Soldiers passed their time with song and their lyrics are preserved to this day, performed by both pop artists and living historians. But what if these cultural artifacts reside outside the United States? Why is there a statue of Abraham Lincoln in the city of Manchester? How does a monument dedicated to the martyrs at the Lune Street Riots on Preston, Lancashire relate …

Seeing The Forest For The Roads: Auto-Tourism And Wilderness Preservation In Mount Hood National Forest, 1913-64, Taylor Elliott Rose

Dissertations and Theses

Between 1913 and 1964, automobile roads appeared throughout the Cascade Mountains around Mount Hood, just east of Portland, Oregon. From elaborate scenic highways to primitive dirt trails, each had its own story. Many of them are gone today, decommissioned and decomposing with the rotting understory soil of the forest. However, some remain as the most utilized spaces in Mount Hood National Forest, one of the most popular public land units for recreation in the country, owned and managed by the United States Forest Service. "Seeing the Forest for the Roads" uncovers the history of why roads were built, who planned …

"On This, We Shall Build": The Struggle For Civil Rights In Portland, Oregon 1945-1953, Justin Legrand Vipperman

Dissertations and Theses

Generally, Oregon historians begin Portland Civil Rights history with the development of Vanport and move quickly through the passage of the state's public accommodations law before addressing the 1960s and 70s. Although these eras are ripe with sources and contentious experiences, 1945 to 1953 provide a complex struggle for civil rights in Portland, Oregon. This time period demonstrates the rise of local leaders, wartime racial tensions, and organizational efforts used to combat inequality. 1945 marked a watershed moment in Portland Civil Rights history exhibiting intergroup collaboration and interracial cooperation converging to eventually provide needed legislation. Although discrimination continued after 1953, …

A Bridge Across The Pacific: A Study Of The Shifting Relationship Between Portland And The Far East, Michael Todd Gagle

Dissertations and Theses

After Japan invaded Manchuria in 1931, both Japan and China sought the support of America. There has been a historical assumption that, starting with the hostilities in 1931, the Japanese were maligned in American public opinion. Consequently, the assumption has been made that Americans supported the Chinese without reserve during their conflict with Japan in the 1930s.

The aim of this study is to question the accuracy of that assumption in the case of Portland, Oregon. An analysis of newspapers and print material specifically focusing on Japan and China from before the conflict reveal that the general American opinion of …

From Tulsa To Ferguson: Redefining Race Riots And Racialized Violence, Hesley R. Keenan

Dissertations and Theses

No abstract provided.