After establishing himself as a pioneer in the news media industry in Texas, Will Hobby served as Lt. Gov. of Texas from 1915 until September 1917, when he became Governor. He led Texas’ effort to support the American military during World War I, and he had to resolve significant political and social issues that swept […]
Feb 17, 2022
First drawn into the fight against racial segregation in the 1960s, Alice Embree became a leader of Students for a Democratic Society at the University of Texas at Austin and embarked on a lifelong journey of social activism involving a wide array of grassroots political, economic, social, and cultural causes. The Briscoe Center has recently […]
Oct 29, 2021
It might surprise you that the Briscoe Center’s collections are not only global in their reach—they are, literally, astronomical. In this episode, we will explore outer space through the art of quilts. While living on the International Space Station in 2013, astronaut (and UT alum) Karen Nyberg stitched a nine-inch, star-themed quilt block. She and […]
Oct 29, 2021
Americans have been shocked by the stream of visual information that has flooded the news and social media over the past year. We have also witnessed the deplorable treatment of many journalists covering these events. In this episode, we’ll hear from Carolyn Cole, a photojournalist with the Los Angeles Times whose archive is part of the Briscoe […]
Apr 8, 2021
The passage of the 19th Amendment guaranteed the right to vote for women — a significant constitutional milestone. But women’s activism has not always united disparate groups into collective action, nor have its aims and achievements always resulted in equity. In this episode, the Briscoe Center’s Dr. Sarah Sonner and filmmakers Ellen Temple and Nancy […]
Mar 25, 2021
A pioneer of a street-theater approach to activism, Abbie Hoffman played a key role in the Chicago police riot of 1968 and the ensuing court case known as the trial of the Chicago 7. Johanna Hoffman Lawrenson discussed their shared life together, both in the spotlight and on the run. Robert Abzug and Thorne Dreyer […]
Dec 21, 2020
Don Carleton speaks with Daina Berry, chair of the Department of History at UT Austin. Her research and teaching—which focuses on the history of the enslaved—has utilized many of the Briscoe Center’s collections, in particular the Natchez Trace Collection, a which documents life in the Lower Mississippi River Valley from the 1760s to the 1920s. […]
Nov 25, 2020
Sometimes, politics is so nasty, so partisan, that you better laugh—or else you might cry. Molly Ivins was a legendary reporter and columnist — hilariously acerbic, staunchly feminist and uniquely Texan — who pilloried the powerful and defended democracy. She is the subject of “Raise Hell” a documentary biographic by filmmaker Janice Engel. This episode […]
Nov 16, 2020
Investigative reporter Wayne Barrett began reporting on Donald Trump in 1979. He was perhaps the first journalist to take Trump seriously and became a renowned authority on the would-be president, as well as a mentor to a new generation of muckraking journalists. Barrett died the day before Trump took the oath of office. Fran Barrett […]
Oct 30, 2020
Don Carleton speaks with Ben Wright about the Briscoe Center’s Texas Oil Industry records, which help document the miseries of the Spanish Flu pandemic between 1918 and 1920. Austin American-Statesman columnist Michael Barnes and Christopher Rose Ph.D., a lecturer at St. Edwards University, join later in the episode to discuss the pandemic’s effects in the […]
Oct 30, 2020
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