Texas Disability History Collection

Elizabeth Richards Andujar was the first woman and also the first Republican from Tarrant County to be elected to the Texas Senate. She served Senate District 12 from 1973-1982. Senator Andujar was elected President Pro Tempore of the Texas Senate for the 65th legislative session. Her committee service included state affairs, human resources, economic development, chairman for the subcommittee on public health, and vice chairman for the committee on nominations. She was listed in "Who's Who in American Politics" and shared the title of "Female Newsmaker of the Year" in 1972. Senator Andujar's papers include newsletters and correspondance about deaf Texans and organizations such as ARC of Fort Worth, Texas Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation and other agencies/services for Texans with disabilities.

TARO link: http://www.lib.utexas.edu/taro/utarl/00103/arl-00103.html

 The Dallas Central Labor Council which was affiliated with the American Federation of Labor was organized in 1910. It had earlier been known as the Dallas Branch of the American Federation of Labor. It merged with the Dallas Area CIO Council in 1956 to form the Dallas AFL-CIO Council. This collection is primarily comprised of executive board and regular council minutes. Also included are financial records; auditor's reports; local, state and national election materials; and AFL-CIO publications and Lighthouse for the Blind pamphlets.

TARO link: http://www.lib.utexas.edu/taro/utarl/02143/arl-02143.html

The papers are composed of the legislative and campaign materials of Don Kennard, who represented Tarrant County in the Texas House of Representatives from 1953 until 1962 and in the Texas Senate from 1963 until 1972. Included are materials from state organizations providing programs and services to the blind as well as the Texas Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation.

TARO link: http://www.lib.utexas.edu/taro/utarl/00080/arl-00080.html

The Fort Worth Trades Assembly, American Federal of Labor (AFL), organized April 4, 1894, was a central organization of AFL affiliated local unions in Tarrant County. It merged with the Tarrant County Industrial Union Council-CIO on August 15, 1957, to form the Tarrant County Central Labor Council, AFL-CIO.

Records include correspondence, 1937-1957; financial records, 1925-1957; minutes, 1901-1957 (microfilm, 1901-1936); photograph; membership lists, 1940-1957; legal documents, and printed material. Includes records of Tarrant County Labor's League for Political Education, 1949-1957, and the Fort Worth-Tarrant County Health Education Committee. Includes correspondence with the Dallas Central Labor Council and the Federation of the Physically Handicapped.

TARO link: http://www.lib.utexas.edu/taro/utarl/00045/arl-00045.html

Helping Restore Ability was founded as the Arlington Handicapped Association in 1977 by a young man with polio, Sam Provence, and his determined friends. They believed with unswerving passion that a physical disability should not keep a person from participating fully in society and living an independent and active life. As services expanded beyond the city limits, Arlington Handicapped Association was renamed the Handicapped Resource Association in 1988. Beginning in 1999, Arlington Handicapped Association began doing business as Helping Restore Ability, a name that reflects the goals and mission without the implied restrictions of the word ‘handicapped.’ The legal name was changed to Helping Restore Ability in 2011. The organization helps Texans with disabilities and their families to find the care they need, and envisions a future in which no Texan with a disability lacks the resources they need to live a full and independent life.

Joe P. Hawn was the representative from the Pleasant Grove section of Dallas, Texas, during the 61st through 63rd sessions (1969-1973) of the Texas House of Representatives. He was a retired Captain of the Dallas Fire Department and served six years as Manager of the Pleasant Grove Chamber of Commerce before being elected a state representative in 1968.

TARO link: http://www.lib.utexas.edu/taro/utarl/00056/arl-00056.html

The records consist primarily of correspondence from 1976 through 1978 in support of John Hill's candidacy for governor in 1978. Records include correspondence, reports, minutes, financial documents, photographs, speeches, notes, lists, and printed material. Hill was born in Breckenridge, Texas, in 1923. He received a law degree from The University of Texas in 1947 after service in the Navy during World War II. Except for his service as Secretary of State from 1966 to 1967 and as Attorney General from 1973 to 1978, he has been a trial lawyer in Houston. In May, 1978 he defeated Dolph Briscoe for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination, but was defeated in the November election by Republican Bill Clements.

Josie Eugenia Green Hamilton Washington, an African American home economics educator in Dallas, Texas, taught in Dallas schools for more than forty years. She first taught at Booker T. Washington High School and then at Lincoln High School from 1939 until her retirement in 1971. She was also very active in activities at the Munger Avenue Baptist Church; in her sorority, Kappa Zeta, the Dallas chapter of Zeta Phi Beta; the Dunbar Social Club Woman's Auxiliary; and the Maria Morgan Branch of the YWCA of Metropolitan Dallas. Papers contain programs, minute book, calendars, scrapbook, photographs, manual, and final examination. The collection contains Zeta Annual Birthday Calendars which include advertisements of African American businesses, the names and birth dates of the sorority sisters, candid photographs of families (infants to young teenagers) of the sorority members' children, and dates of importance to the sorority. There is a scrapbook of Zeta memorabilia, 1944-1947, and a minute book of the Kappa Zeta Chapter, 1951-1955. Included is a formal color portrait of Washington as a young woman and a few items from her years at Lincoln High School, as well as a teaching procedures manual, a final examination, and commencement programs.

This collection documents the activities of labor and civic leader, Mansfield M. McKnight, and his wife, Reecy W. McKnight. Mansfield McKnight served in leadership roles for several labor organizations in Fort Worth and Texas, including the Fort Worth Typographical Union, Local 198 and the Fort Worth Trades Assembly. He also served on the Fort Worth City Council and as Mayor Pro Tem for the City of Fort Worth. His wife, Reecy W. McKnight, completed his city council term upon his death and she went on to serve three more terms in the office. The bulk of the collection materials pertain to the couples' involvement in labor organizations and activities and include photographs, certificates, correspondence, programs, and clippings. Some correspondence and clippings concerning Mansfield M. McKnight's death in 1956, badges for the Fort Worth Stock Show, and membership certificates are also present.

TARO link: http://www.lib.utexas.edu/taro/utarl/02325/arl-02325.html

Robert Hanks Brister, son of a pioneer Burleson, Texas, family, was a World War I Army baker, a public school superintendent, a Baptist deacon, a Waco-based insurance agent, and a president of the Texas State Teachers Association. He also worked at the Veterans Administration's vocational rehabilitation service in Waco and became an insurance underwriter. Brister married Ruby Irene "Bob" Neal, a Weatherford, Texas, native, on April 23, 1921; they had two children. His papers include correspondence, photographs, family histories and genealogies, books, school annuals, pamphlets, newspaper clippings, financial records, speeches, memorabilia, artifacts, ephemera, and certificates. The papers document Brister's years as a college student, math teacher, soldier, school administrator, teacher advocate, civic leader, and insurance agent. Handwritten personal correspondence received during his years as a student and a soldier includes details of daily farm life and social banter from classmates and girlfriends. Materials documenting his years as an educator include speeches, reports to school boards, correspondence with colleagues, and efforts to obtain employment upon his resignation as Waco superintendent. Noteworthy are six photo albums, a vintage camera in its original leather case, a double locket, and two patriotic silk handkerchiefs. The papers include some material about African American schools, namely yearbooks from Waco's segregated Moore High School.

Sammie L. Provence (1949-1982) contracted Bulbar polio at the age of 9, became quadriplegic, and spent ten months in Houston's Southwest Poliomyletis Respiratory Center. For the rest of his life, Mr. Provence relied on a respirator during the day and an iron lung at night to help with breathing problems. He earned a B.S. in business and M.A. in history from the University of Texas at Arlington, and was just three weeks away from completing his teaching certificate at the time of his death in 1982. Provence was an activist and leader in promoting legislation for wheelchair accessibility. Provence co-established the Handicapped Students Association at UTA and was instrumental in leading the university to become a barrier-free model campus. In 1977, he founded and was the first president of the Arlington Handicapped Association. Provence  was an advocate for public transportation for the disabled. In addition, he served on a number of city, state, and national committees for the disabled, including the Dallas Committee for the Handicapped. Provence realized his dream in 1982, when he obtained funding to establish residences for six severely disabled men that would allow them to live independently.

The Shorthorn, which replaced The Grubbonian, began as a monthly magazine in April of 1919. The student body selected the name "Shorthorn" during a campus-wide contest during which students submitted possible names. During 1922, The Shorthorn changed from a monthly to a weekly publication.

Since 2013 oral history audio interviews have been conducted by undergraduate minors in Disability Studies, graduate students in Public History and the staff of the Disability Studies program. Students work under the supervision of Dr. Sarah Rose, director of the Disability Studies Minor, and Dr. Gerald Saxon, director of the Public History MA program, and an associate professor of history at UT Arlington.

Wendell Nedderman served as president of the University of Texas at Arlington from February 1974 to July 1992. It was a particularly interesting period in the history of UTA to quote Nedderman, "During my tenure in the President's chair, change has been the order of the day. A somewhat unique aspect of my tenure has been that associated with a relatively new, rapidly growing university whose role and scope has been in a constant state of evolution toward graduate programs and research as well as with other facets associated with a comprehensive, maturing university. Enrollment has increased from 13,500 in 1972, to 25,271 in 1991. Graduate student enrollment has increased from 936 to over 4,200. We have added twenty baccalaureate, twenty-three masters, and seventeen doctoral degree titles during the same period of time. Furthermore, a School of Architecture, a School of Nursing, and a Center for Professional Teacher Education have been added. The physical plant inventory shows some twenty new buildings or major additions to buildings."

He had served the University of Texas at Arlington in many capacities prior to his work as president. He was the first Dean of Engineering, a post he held, 1959-1969, while concurrently serving as vice president for Research and Graduate Affairs, 1967-1968, and as the Graduate School administrator, 1967-1969. He also was vice president for Academic Affairs, 1968-1972.

TARO link: http://www.lib.utexas.edu/taro/utarl/00117/arl-00117.html

The University of Texas at Arlington (UTA) publications collection is comprised of printed materials created and produced by the University, academic departments, faculty, and staff.  Included in the collection are newsletters, programs, brochures, booklets, pamphlets, reports announcements, and bulletins.  

In 1976, the sport of wheelchair basketball was introduced to UT Arlington as a recreational event for disabled students. The UT Arlington Freewheelers changed its name to the UT Arlington Movin Mavs when it began intercollegiate competition in 1988. They were the first Intercollegiate Wheelchair Basketball Team to be invited to meet the President of the United States, as most other National Champs are honored, in 1993. They have won seven national championships as of 2011. Many individual Movin Mavs players have received recognition, and some went on to winning gold medals for their home countries in the Olympics.

Papers contain correspondence, reports, proposals, clippings, newsletters, legal documents, photographs, minutes, plans, brochures, pamphlets, charts, lists, programs, studies, notes, and graduate school evaluations. Files of W.A. Baker while acting as Vice President and Vice President for Academic Affairs as well as the files of Wendell H. Nedderman who was Vice President for Academic Affairs before Baker. Includes some correspondence of President Frank Harrison, who served as UTA President from 1969-1972. Materials document a wide range of topics pertaining to various UTA academic programs including the art, business, education, engineering, chemistry, economics, music, and science departments.

The Office of Vice President for Academic Affairs is second only to that of President of the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA). Wendell H. Nedderman served as Vice President for Academic Affairs from 1967 until 1972. W.A. Baker, Jr., succeeded Nedderman in 1972 when Nedderman was appointed acting president of the university.

TARO link: http://www.lib.utexas.edu/taro/utarl/02316/arl-02316.html