The Battle of the Alamo: How Should It be Remembered? [] Lifelong Learning Program

Gerie Bledsoe

 2 classes, Tues Nov 16 and Thurs 18. Class 1:00 – 3:00.

THIS IS A ZOOM COURSE ONLY.
HOURS ARE CENTRAL TIME ZONE.
In English

Register HERE

“Remember the Alamo!” has been a battle cry in Texas for decades. This course will carefully consider the traditional and alternative answers to that question. Should it be remembered as a story of heroic martyrs defending the Alamo against the enemy, as portrayed by 1960s Hollywood movies and as taught to generations of Texas schoolchildren?  Should it be remembered quite differently as portrayed by modern scholars?  Or should it be a combination of both?

The story starts in December 1835 when immigrants from the U.S. and their local Mexican friends forced Mexican soldiers out of the Mexican province of Tejas. In response, a Mexican army with orders to take no prisoners, under the command of General Santa Anna, the acting president of Mexico, marched into Tejas the next year and surrounded more than 200 Texians and Tejanos, including women and children, in the Alamo, an old mission and walled compound near San Antonio de Béxar. The siege lasted thirteen days before the defenders were overwhelmed and killed, including their commanders, James Bowie, William Travis, and Davy Crockett, who are considered martyrs.  There are many martyrs in this story!

The course will review the reasons for U.S. immigration into this part of Mexico, the Mexican reaction to political developments in Tejas, the goals of the leaders of the independence movement, and related events in the United States. What this story has meant for Mexican Americans living in Texas will also be discussed.  Texans are especially invited to take this course.  Please leave your firearms at the door.

Gerie B. Bledsoe attended elementary and middle school in Ft. Worth, Texas, where he first learned about the Battle of the Alamo. Bledsoe went on to earn a master’s and doctorate in modern European history from the Florida State University. He taught European and Russian history at Randolph-Macon College in Virginia. After leaving teaching, he held staff positions with the American Association of University Professors, National Education Association, and Michigan State University. This is the ninth course he has offered for the Life-Long Learning Program since 2012.