CWRT-DC's Previous Meeting:

GAIL STEPHENS

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

Ft. McNair Officers' Club, Washington, DC (see map here)

6 pm: Social Hour (cash bar)
7 pm: Dinner ($30 for dinner and lecture)
8 pm: Lecture ($5 for lecture only)

Reservations required: Call (703) 578-1942

TOPIC:
"The Battle of Monocacy:
  The Final Invasion; Jubal Early, 1864"


 Summary of Presentation:
In the fourth summer of the Civil War, a Confederate army came close to carrying off the improbable: the seizure of Washington, DC.  In June 1864, Lt. Gen. Jubal Early slipped away from the works around Richmond, where Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia faced Grant and the Army of the Potomac, and moved rapidly through the Shenandoah Valley into Maryland with an army of 16,000 veterans. Lee’s orders to Early:  take Washington, which had been stripped of veteran troops to reinforce Grant. The Union high command in Washington refused to believe the first reports of a major Confederate force moving north through the Valley and took no action. The stage was set for a race between Early’s veterans and Grant’s reinforcements. Though the Confederates did not succeed, this little known campaign is one of the most exciting and potentially most momentous of the Civil War.

Biography:
Gail Stephens has a Bachelor’s Degree in International Politics from George Washington University in Washington DC and did graduate work at Johns Hopkins and Harvard Universities. She worked for the Department of Defense for 26 years, retiring in 1994 as a member of the Department’s Senior Executive Service.

Upon retirement, Ms. Stephens began studying the American Civil War.  She volunteers at Monocacy National Battlefield near Frederick, Maryland, lectures regularly on various Civil War topics, including Monocacy, Major General Lew Wallace, and the 1864 Maryland campaign.  Ms. Stephens also gives battlefield tours.

In 2002, Ms. Stephens won the National Park Service’s E.W. Peterkin award for her contributions to public understanding of Civil War history. She is on the board of the General Lew Wallace Study Museum and chairs the board of the Western Maryland Interpretive Association, which is responsible for the bookstores at Antietam and Monocacy.

Ms. Stephens has written articles on Lew Wallace and Early’s 1864 invasion of the North for various Civil War publications. Her book on Wallace’s Civil War career, Shadow of Shiloh, published by the Indiana Historical Society Press in October 2010, won the Civil War Forum of New York City’s William Henry Seward Award for best Civil War biography of 2011.

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For information about the Round Table and to apply for membership, visit http://cwrtdc-resources.blogspot.com/   

CWRT-DC's Previous Meeting:

ROBERT LEE HODGE

Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Ft. McNair Officers' Club, Washington, DC (see map here)

6 pm: Social Hour (cash bar)
7 pm: Dinner ($30 for dinner and lecture)
8 pm: Lecture ($5 for lecture only)

Reservations required: Call (703) 578-1942

TOPIC:
"Confederates in the Attic"

Biography:
Robert Lee Hodge - born on Stonewall Jackson’s birthday - has had a keen interest in The War Between the States since age 4.

For over 25 years Robert has worked in historical based films – from dramas like ABC's North and South and TNT’s Gettysburg and Andersonville, to many programs on The History Channel, Arts and Entertainment Channel, and the National Geographic Channel, to his own Civil War documentaries that have won 5 Tally awards and an Emmy in 2007.

Robert has been featured on National Public Radio's Talk of the Nation, NBC's Late, Late Show, The New Yorker, The Wall Street Journal, the PBS program Going Places, C-SPAN II, and on the National Public Radio program Soundscapes.

Robert has also written for The Nashville Tennessean, America’s Civil War magazine, The Washington Post, and North and South magazine. He played a major role in the New York Times' 1998 best-selling book Confederates in the Attic (and appears on the cover) hosting Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Tony Hurwitz, on an eclectic and memorable Civil War tour-de-force of historic sites.  Robert was a historical researcher, primarily at The National Archives and Library of Congress, working with nationally-recognized experts. He also was principle researcher on Time-Life Books 18-volume series Voices of the Civil War and The Illustrated History of the Civil War.

Robert became interested in preserving historic green space when he interned with the National Park Service's Civil War Sites Advisory Commission. Rob has organized battlefield preservation fundraisers that have garnered over $140,000 for the purchase of endangered battlefield land. He serves on the board of directors of the Central Virginia Battlefields Trust, an organization that has protected nearly one thousand acres near Fredericksburg, Virginia. 

Robert will have for purchase at the dinner his Tally award-winning documentaries on the battles on Spotsylvania, VA, and Perryville, KY, as well as his Emmy-award winner on Franklin, TN.  He will also have information on how to join the Central Virginia Battlefields Trust.
 

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For information about the Round Table and to apply for membership, visit http://cwrtdc-resources.blogspot.com/   

CWRT-DC's Previous Meeting:

DR. KENNETH J. HEINEMAN

Tuesday, April 8, 2014

Ft. McNair Officers' Club, Washington, DC (see map here)

6 pm: Social Hour (cash bar)
7 pm: Dinner ($30 for dinner and lecture)
8 pm: Lecture ($5 for lecture only)

Reservations required: Call (703) 578-1942

TOPIC:
"The Ewing Family of Ohio"

Summary of Presentation:

Dr. Heineman will discuss the foster family that raised and supported the young man who would become "General William T. Sherman."  Although lost in the historical shadow cast by their foster son, it was the Ewing family who raised him, got him into West Point, and provided him with the financial resources and political connections to succeed in war. 

The patriarch, Thomas Ewing, counseled presidents and clashed with radical abolitionists and southern secessionists leading to the Civil War. Three Ewing sons became Union generals, served with distinction at Antietam and Vicksburg, marched through Georgia, and fought guerillas in Missouri. The Ewing family stood at the center of the Northern debate over emancipation, fought for the soul of the Republican Party, and waged total war against the South.

This history is also discussed in Dr. Heineman's book, Civil War Dynasty: The Ewing Family of Ohio, which brings to life this drama of political intrigue and military valor. It is a military, political, religious, and family history, told against the backdrop of disunion, war, violence, and grief. 

Biography:

Dr. Heineman spent 18 years at Ohio University Lancaster working in Sherman's hometown. Every morning after he would drop off his kids at school, he would sit at Four Reasons and stare at the Sherman mural downtown. There was always this presence," said Heineman "But the Ewing Mansion was just up the hill on Main Street and the more he started looking into the Ewings, the more he realized there was a story here, a great story."

Dr. Heineman is now a professor of history and department chair at Angelo State University in Texas. His areas of specialization include United States social and political history in the 20th century; American immigration; urban, labor and religious history; social movements.

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For information about the Round Table and to apply for membership, visit http://cwrtdc-resources.blogspot.com/   

CWRT-DC's Previous Meeting:

W. STUART TOWNS

Tuesday, March 11, 2014

Ft. McNair Officers' Club, Washington, DC (see map here)

6 pm: Social Hour (cash bar)
7 pm: Dinner ($30 for dinner and lecture)
8 pm: Lecture ($5 for lecture only)

Reservations required: Call (703) 578-1942


TOPIC:
"Enduring Legacy: The Lost Cause Myth"

Summary of Presentation:
Rhetoric and ritual commemorating war has been a part of human culture for ages. In Enduring Legacy: Rhetoric and Ritual of the Lost Cause, Dr. W. Stuart Towns explores the crucial role of rhetoric and oratory in creating and propagating a “Lost Cause” public memory of the American South. Enduring Legacy explores the vital place of ceremonial oratory in the oral tradition in the South. It analyzes how rituals such as Confederate Memorial Day, Confederate veteran reunions, and dedication of Confederate monuments have contributed to creating and sustaining a Lost Cause paradigm for southern identity.

Dr. Towns studies in detail post–Civil War southern speeches and how they laid the groundwork for future generations, from southern responses to the civil rights movement and beyond. The Lost Cause orators that came after the Civil War, he argues, helped to shape a lasting mythology of the brave Confederate martyrs and of the southern positions for why the Confederacy lost and who was to blame. Innumerable words were spent—in commemorative speeches, newspaper editorials, and statehouse oratory—condemning the evils of Reconstruction, redemption, and reconciliation, and praising the new and future South. Dr. Towns concludes with an analysis of how Lost Cause myths still influence southern and national perceptions of the region today, as evidenced in debates over the continued deployment of the Confederate flag and the popularity of Civil War reenactments.

Biography:
W. Stuart Towns, Ph.D., has spent more than 40 years following his passion for history.  His educational pursuits in his undergraduate and graduate studies developed a love for public speaking and the impact words have had on history, especially Southern history.

The 1950s and 1960s led Dr. Towns to the University of Arkansas on a track and cross-country scholarship; he continued his education at the University of Florida where he received his masters and doctoral degrees in Speech (1962 and 1972 respectively). Through his career he served as chair of the Communication departments at The University of West Florida, Appalachian State University, and Southeast Missouri State University. He retired in 2011.

Dr. Towns had a parallel second career in the U.S. Army, which began when he enrolled in R.O.T.C. at the University of Arkansas. He earned a spot on the United States Modern Pentathlon team; he competed in the 1964 Olympic Trials in modern pentathlon, marathon, and fencing. After completing his active duty, Dr. Towns served the rest of his military career in the Active Army Reserves in the Civil Affairs branch, mostly with the 361st CA Brigade in Pensacola, FL. He took an opportunity to become a member of the Consulting Faculty Program at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas in 1973 and served in that role until 1996. Dr. Towns retired as a Colonel in the Active Army Reserves in 1996.

Dr. Towns’ most recent publication, Enduring Legacy: Rhetoric and Ritual of the Lost Cause (University of Alabama Press, 2012), demonstrates his interest in examining the history of southern rhetoric and oratory. He was working on an anthology of southern speeches and saw that some of the segregationist speakers in the Civil Rights era of the 1950s and 1960s were making some of the same points and using many of the same words as southern orators from the 1880s and 1890s. He soon discovered that debates of the 1990s and on into the 21st century over Confederate flags, Confederate monuments, and other memorabilia were still repeating some of the same 19th century messages. The Civil War was alive and well in southern public memory.  As a result of seeing that connection, Dr. Towns wrote Enduring Legacy.

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For information about the Round Table and to apply for membership, visit http://cwrtdc-resources.blogspot.com/   

CWRT-DC's Previous Meeting:

ANNE SARAH RUBIN

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Ft. McNair Officers' Club, Washington D.C. (see map here)

6 pm: Social Hour (cash bar)
7 pm: Dinner ($30 for dinner and lecture)
8 pm: Lecture ($5 for lecture only)

Reservations required: Call (703) 578-1942


TOPIC:
"Through the Heart of Dixie: Sherman's March and America"

Dr. Rubin will discuss her forthcoming book and web project: Through the Heart of Dixie: Sherman's March and America. Rather than retell the story of the march, this project explores the myriad ways in which Americans have remembered, retold, and re-imagined Sherman's march. It looks at the march from a kaleidoscope of perspectives (African-Americans, Union soldiers, Confederates, women, environmental) and a mosaic of sources (travel accounts, memoirs, music, literature, films and newspapers). Through the Heart of Dixie unpacks the many myths and legends that have grown up around the march, not in the service of proving them true or false, but rather to use them as a lens into the ways that Americans' thoughts about the Civil War have changed over time.  

Biography:
Dr. Anne Sarah Rubin is an Associate Professor of History and Director of the Center for Digital History and Education at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC).  She received her AB from Princeton University and her MA and PhD at the University of Virginia.  Professor Rubin joined the UMBC History Department in the Fall of 2000.  Her teaching and research focus on the American Civil War, the U.S. South, nineteenth century America, and digital history.

Dr. Rubin is currently finishing a book entitled Through the Heart of Dixie: Sherman’s March and America, which is scheduled to be published in early 2014.  Her first book, A Shattered Nation: The Rise and Fall of the Confederacy, 1861-1868, focuses on Confederate nationalism and identity.  It won the 2006 Avery O. Craven book prize for the best book in Civil War history.

Dr. Rubin has also worked extensively with electronic media and is co-author of a CD-ROM, The Valley of the Shadow: The Eve of War.  That project won the first eLincoln Prize for the best digital project in American Civil War History as well as the James Harvey Robinson Prize, which is awarded biennially for the teaching aid that has made the most outstanding contribution to the teaching and learning of history in any field for public or educational purposes.

Dr. Rubin is currently President of the Society of Civil War Historians.  She is a member of the Maryland State Archives Legacy of Slavery Project Advisory Board and the Editorial Board of Civil War History.  She is also an OAH Distinguished Lecturer (2011-2014).

Dr. Rubin's website can be found at http://history.umbc.edu/facultystaff/full-time/anne-sarah-rubin/

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For information about the Round Table and to apply for membership, visit http://cwrtdc-resources.blogspot.com/