Project and content management for Contemporary Authors volumes
WORK TITLE: Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE:
CITY:
STATE:
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY:
http://www.famu.edu/index.cfm?histpol&Guzman,William * http://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/84pna7am9780252038921.html * http://www.njcu.edu/news/njcu-appoints-dr-will-guzm%C3%A1n-director-lee-hagan-africana-studies-center
RESEARCHER NOTES:
LC control no.: no2015096119
LCCN Permalink: https://lccn.loc.gov/no2015096119
HEADING: Guzmán, Will
000 00821cz a2200217n 450
001 9917375
005 20150820073849.0
008 150722n| azannaabn |a aaa c
010 __ |a no2015096119
035 __ |a (OCoLC)oca10224429
040 __ |a NN |b eng |e rda |c NN |d FU
100 1_ |a Guzmán, Will
370 __ |e Florida |2 naf
372 __ |a History |2 lcsh
373 __ |a Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University |2 naf
374 __ |a Historians |a College teachers |a Authors, Black |2 lcsh
375 __ |a male
377 __ |a eng
400 1_ |a Guzmán, William
670 __ |a Civil rights in the Texas borderlands, 2015: |b title page (Will Guzmán) cover (he is an assistant professor of history and African American studies at Florida A&M University)
670 __ |a Guzmán, William. Landmarks & legacies, 2000: |b title page verso (William Guzmán)
PERSONAL
Male.
EDUCATION:Florida A&M University, B.S. (summa cum laude); Florida State University, M.S.; University of Texas at El Paso, Ph.D.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Florida A&M University, Tallahassee, FL, assistant professor of history and African American studies.
MEMBER:National Council for Black Studies, West African Research Association (life member), FAMU & UTEP National Alumni Associations (life member), Association for the Study of African American Life and History, Southern Conference on African American Studies (life member).
AWARDS:C. Calvin Smith Book Prize, Southern Conference on African American Studies, 2016; “Neighbor of the Year,” City of Tallahassee and Council of Neighborhood Associations, 2016.
WRITINGS
Also author of Landmarks & Legacies, 2000. Contributor to journals and periodicals, including Password 60, Northwest Ohio History, and Griot.
SIDELIGHTS
Will Guzmán is an assistant professor of History and African American Studies at Florida A&M University. He is a contributor to journals and periodicals, including Password 60, Northwest Ohio History, and Griot.
In 2015 Guzmán published Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands: Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon and Black Activism. Citing newspapers, census records, government documents, and personal papers, Guzmán looks at the racial climate for African American professionals during the early part of the twentieth century. Using the life of Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon, a black physician, as an example, the book details the fact that even though many blacks advanced to high levels in their professions in the Southwest U.S., this progress came at a price. Many blacks suffered from racial violence or were ignored, despite governmental efforts to afford them the same rights as white professionals. The book follows Nixon from birth, through his time at medical school and his opening of a medical practice, to his death in a car accident in 1966. His first practice was opened in Cameron, Texas, in 1906, but extreme prejudice, often leading to violence by the townspeople, caused him to relocate to El Paso, Texas, where he practiced in a multiethnic area of the city. He retired in 1963.
While feeling that Guzmán “could have explored similarities and differences between other cities in the West or on the Mexican border more fully,” D.L. Bryant, writing in Choice, felt that “this book breaks new ground in an area scholars have seldom tackled.” Brandon Kyron Lenzie Winford, in the Journal of Southern History, wrote that while “In some instances, his approach creates lengthy backstories, which mean the book’s subject–Nixon–often gets lost in the narrative. … This worthwhile study contributes to borderlands history and the literature on black physicians in the civil rights movement, and it shifts the Jim Crow terrain to the American Southwest.”
“The L.A. Nixon story is truly amazing for its courage, ideals, and commitment to the betterment of El Paso, the international border, and nation at large,” Guzmán once said. “Perhaps his greatest legacy was his attempts to vote in the all-white Texas Democratic Primary, which led to important Supreme Court decisions: Nixon v. Herndon (1927) and Nixon v Condone (1932),” Guzmán said. “These two cases ultimately would be used as the legal precedent for the famous Smith v. Allwright (1944) case that banned all-white primaries throughout the South and allowed many African Americans to register and vote in many parts throughout the region.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Choice, March, 2016, D.L. Bryant, review of Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands: Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon and Black Activism, p. 1070.
Journal of Southern History, August, 2016, Brandon Kyron Lenzie Winford, review of Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands, pp. 726–.
ONLINE
El Paso Times, http://www.elpasotimes.com/ (June 6, 2015), Ramón Rentería, review of Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands.
Florida A&M University Web site, http://www.famu.edu/ (February 25, 2017), faculty profile of author.
Will Guzmán
Assistant Professor, History & African American Studies
409-Thomas DeSaille Tucker Hall
850-561-2068 / email
“Until the Lions have their own Historians, tales of the Hunt shall always glorify the Hunter.”
-Igbo Proverb
What can I do with a degree in Africana Studies? Why Study History?
Education:
Ph.D., History, University of Texas–El Paso
M.S., Social Science Education, Florida State University
B.S., African American Studies (summa cum laude), Florida A&M University
FAMU positions:
Assistant Professor, History/African American Studies Department
Associate Director, Carrie P. Meek-James N. Eaton Southeastern Regional Black Archives Research Center and Museum
Director, Office of Black Diasporan Culture
Visiting Assistant Professor, History/African American Studies Department
Adjunct Instructor, History/African American Studies Department
Research Interests:
African American History
Afro-Latinas/os History
Caribbean & Latin American History
United States History
Courses Taught:
African American Experience
African American History, 1865-present
African History, 19th & 20th Centuries
Afro-Latin America
Blackness and National Identity Formation in Puerto Rico
Blacks, Mass Incarceration, and the Police
Contemporary Problems: Modern Afro-Latin America & Caribbean
Introduction to African American History
Introduction to African American Studies
Introduction to Professional Development
Latin American History
Malcolm X (Omowale): Life, Impact, and Legacy
Teaching Social Studies
United States History, 1865-present
Publications:
Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands: Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon and Black Activism (University of Illinois Press, 2015-cloth; 2016-paperback).
Refereed/Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles:
“The El Paso NAACP, 1923 and 1929,” Password 60, no. 3 (Fall 2016): 70-87.
“Toledo’s Tandy: Drusilla E. Nixon” Northwest Ohio History 84, no. 2 (Spring 2017): forthcoming.
“The Making of a Political Activist,” The Griot 35, no. 1 (Spring 2017): forthcoming.
Public History Publications:
FAMU Way Historical Survey, with David H. Jackson, Jr., Reginald K. Ellis, and Darius J. Young (City of Tallahassee/Leon County Government: Blueprint 2000 Intergovernmental Agency, 2015).
Dr. L.A. Nixon Historical Marker, no. 13853 located at 3231 E. Wyoming Avenue, El Paso, TX (Texas Historical Commission: El Paso Community Foundation, 2003).
Landmarks and Legacies: A Guide to Tallahassee’s African American Heritage, 1865-1970, with Tameka Bradley Hobbs (Tallahassee: John G. Riley House Museum, 2000).
Research in Progress:
Florida's Black Power Movement (under contract, University Press of Florida), edited book with Kwasi Densu
"Raymond A. Brown: Floridian, FAMUan, and Freedom Fighter" (journal article)
“Afro-Puerto Ricans in the United States,” with Samiri Hernández Hiraldo (online essay)
“James N. Eaton and the Rise of Black Studies in Florida,” in Rattler Nation: A Social History of Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University
Awards:
2016 C. Calvin Smith Book Prize, Southern Conference on African American Studies
2016 "Neighbor of the Year," City of Tallahassee and Council of Neighborhood Associations
2015 FAMU "Teacher of The Year," (nominated/runner-up among a faculty of 545)
Community Service:
Chair, Beautification Committee, Providence Neighborhood Association
Board Member, Providence Neighborhood Association Redevelopment Corporation
Board Member, Council on Culture and Arts (City of Tallahassee/Leon County)
Board Member, Petty Officer Doris “Dorie” Miller Medal of Honor National Committee
3rd Party Voter Registration Organization, FL Dept. of State, Division of Elections
Member, FAMU Way Walk Subcommittee, Blueprint 2000 Intergovernmental Agency
University Service:
Member, Graduate Council
Faculty Adviser, NAACP at FAMU
Member, Honorary Degrees Committee
Member, Admissions Disciplinary Committee
Member, African Studies Minor Curriculum Committee
Member, Sabbatical/Professional Development Leave Committee
Member, Carnegie Community Engagement Classification Committee
Member, African American Studies Major & Minor Curriculum Committee
Member, FAMU Graduate Feeder Conference Planning Committee
Member, National Voter Registration Day, Strike the Vote, Power of the Vote initiative
Flag Bearer, Commencement Ceremony, School of Graduate Studies/Research
Professional Service:
Vice President, Tallahassee Historical Society
Book Review Editor, THE GRIOT: The Journal of African American Studies
Reviewer (blurb), Molefi K. Asante, The History of Africa (London: Routledge, 2015)
Member, Florida Education Commissioner's Task Force on African American History
Consultant, "Civil Rights in the Sunshine State" exhibition, Museum of Florida History
Curriculum Design Specialist, Namibia/Botswana Fulbright-Hays Group Project Abroad
Memberships:
National Council for Black Studies
West African Research Association (Life Member)
FAMU & UTEP National Alumni Associations (Life Member)
Association for the Study of African American Life and History
Southern Conference on African American Studies (Life Member)
Will Guzmán is an assistant professor of history and Africana studies at Florida A&M University. He is a coauthor of Landmarks and Legacies: A Guide to Tallahassee's African American Heritage.
FRIDAY, JANUARY 27, 2017 - 10:03
NJCU Appoints Dr. Will Guzmán Director of Lee Hagan Africana Studies Center
Dr. Will Guzmán, a scholar of African/African American history and culture, is the newly appointed Director of the Lee Hagan Africana Studies Center at New Jersey City University.
NJCU’s Lee Hagan Africana Studies Center promotes academic excellence and social responsibility among faculty, students and surrounding community about issues necessary to the empowerment of peoples across the African Diaspora. The Center presents challenging and stimulating workshops, speakers, research, conferences; seminars, exhibitions and performances that help develop and support cultural, political, educational, and economic growth for the community.
Dr. Guzmán came to NJCU in January 2017 from Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University (FAMU) where he was an Assistant Professor in the Department of History and African American Studies.
As an administrator, Dr. Guzmán previously served as Director of the Office of Black Diasporan Culture at Florida A&M University, and as the Associate Director of the Meek-Eaton Southeastern Regional Black Archives Research Center and Museum.
Dr. Guzmán also worked as the site manager, program manager, and senior training manager for the Florida ABOUT FACE! Program for which he planned, developed, and oversaw a $2.5 million state-issued contract and supervised 85 employees at 27 sites statewide.
He has extensive professional and community networking links in the Jersey City community and across New Jersey.
Dr. Guzmán holds a Bachelor of Science degree in African American Studies from FAMU, a Master of Science in Social Science Education from Florida State University, and a Ph.D. with a focus on Borderlands History, U.S. History, and the African Diaspora from the University of Texas—El Paso.
His book, "Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands: Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon and Black Activism" (University of Illinois Press, 2015) won the C. Calvin Smith Book Prize. Dr. Guzmán has published work in peer-reviewed journals and public history publications on various areas of African/African American history and culture.
Among Dr. Guzmán’s research interests are African American history, Afro-Latinas/Latinos history, Caribbean and Latin American history, and United States history.
He is a member of the National Council for Black Studies, the West African Research Association, the Association for the Study of African American Life and History, and the Southern Conference on African American Studies.
Guzman's painstaking efforts provide the broadest possible context, at times to a fault, to tell a much larger story about the black experience in
Texas. In some instances, his approach creates lengthy backstories, which mean the book's subject--Nixon--often gets lost in the narrative.
Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands: Dr. Lawrence A.
Nixon and Black Activism
Brandon Kyron Lenzie Winford
Journal of Southern History.
82.3 (Aug. 2016): p726.
COPYRIGHT 2016 Southern Historical Association
http://www.uga.edu/~sha
Full Text:
Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands: Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon and Black Activism. By Will Guzman. (Urbana and other cities: University of
Illinois Press, 2015. Pp. [xvi], 182. $55.00, ISBN 978-0-252-03892-1.)
In Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands: Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon and Black Activism, Will Guzman offers a sobering analysis of the
opportunities for African Americans in the Southwest in the early twentieth century. The book uses newspapers, census records, government
documents, and personal papers to detail the vast racial wasteland that was the Southwest. Through the lens of Lawrence A. Nixon, a black
physician, the author shows how black professionals confronted racial violence and political disenfranchisement at a time when even the most
determined efforts to secure advancements often came with demoralizing outcomes.
The biography unfolds in five chapters--from Nixon's birth in 1883 to his tragic death in an automobile accident in 1966. The first two chapters
chronicle Nixon's early life and arrival in the borderlands. He was born in Marshall, Texas, where his father worked as a Pullman porter--a
position that came with economic stability. Nixon graduated from historically black Wiley College and then Meharry Medical School in
Nashville, Tennessee. In 1906 he opened his first practice in Cameron, Texas, but soon left because of increasing racial violence. The haunting
experience of taking refuge in his office one night while an angry mob lynched Alex Johnson, a black man, for an alleged offense against a white
woman caused Nixon to flee to El Paso, Texas. There, he settled in Segundo Barrio, a multiethnic part of the city. He practiced medicine there
from 1910 until he retired in 1963.
In El Paso, Nixon became a community activist. Several chapters cover his impact on the pre-1950s civil rights struggle via the local branch of
the NAACP, which Nixon cofounded in 1914. Nixon waged a principled legal attack against all-white Democratic primaries, the process that
decided elections in the one-party South. He was the plaintiff in Nixon v. Herndon (1927) and Nixon v. Condon (1932), in which the U.S.
2/4/2017 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1486233171818 2/4
Supreme Court deemed these Texas primaries unconstitutional. These victories did not eliminate the practice, but they paved the way for Smith v.
Allwright (1944), the landmark decision that outlawed all-white primaries throughout the South.
In straightforward prose, the work presents blaring reminders of how active terrorist organizations like the Ku Klux Klan were in Texas, a state
with the third-largest number of lynchings in the country, behind Georgia and Mississippi. The Klan had no less than 1,500 members in El Paso in
the 1920s, "a small number of whom were police officers" (p. 71). The final chapter shifts focus to Nixon's difficulties in obtaining funding for a
black tuberculosis hospital and his membership in the controversial Southern Conference for Human Welfare.
Guzman's painstaking efforts provide the broadest possible context, at times to a fault, to tell a much larger story about the black experience in
Texas. In some instances, his approach creates lengthy backstories, which mean the book's subject--Nixon--often gets lost in the narrative.
However, this worthwhile study contributes to borderlands history and the literature on black physicians in the civil rights movement, and it shifts
the Jim Crow terrain to the American Southwest.
BRANDON KYRON LENZIE WINFORD
University of Tennessee, Knoxville
Winford, Brandon Kyron Lenzie
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Winford, Brandon Kyron Lenzie. "Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands: Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon and Black Activism." Journal of Southern
History, vol. 82, no. 3, 2016, p. 726+. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA460447813&it=r&asid=5f78f8cbde9a396cf1d0666ad2559d35. Accessed 4 Feb.
2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A460447813
---
2/4/2017 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1486233171818 3/4
Guzman, Will. Civil rights in the Texas borderlands: Dr.
Lawrence A. Nixon and black activism
D.L. Bryant
CHOICE: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries.
53.7 (Mar. 2016): p1070.
COPYRIGHT 2016 American Library Association CHOICE
http://www.ala.org/acrl/choice/about
Full Text:
Guzman, Will. Civil rights in the Texas borderlands: Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon and black activism. Illinois, 2015. 182p index afp ISBN
9780252038921 cloth, $55.00
(cc) 53-3196
E185.97
MARC
Though frequently examining race relations between blacks and whites in Texas, scholars have tended to ignore similar mistreatment on the
Mexican border. One can attribute this lack of focus to the overwhelming presence of Hispanics in border cities such as El Paso. Although a
physician by profession, Lawrence Nixon played an active role in the fight against racial discrimination in far West Texas. According to Guzman
(history and African American studies, Florida A&M Univ.), Nixons past experiences in East and Central Texas led him to open up a practice in
El Paso in an effort to avoid racial tension. When Nixon realized his newly adopted hometown also practiced racial discrimination against
African Americans, he decided to devote his attention in that direction. This short study could probably have gone into more depth about a
number of stated points. For example, Guzman mentions a collaborative effort between El Paso's Hispanic and African American communities,
but he goes into very little depth about it. Moreover, he could have explored similarities and differences between other cities in the West or on the
Mexican border more fully. Criticisms notwithstanding, however, this book breaks new ground in an area scholars have seldom tackled. Summing
Up: *** Highly recommended. All levels/libraries.--D. L. Bryant, Saint Augustine's University
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Bryant, D.L. "Guzman, Will. Civil rights in the Texas borderlands: Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon and black activism." CHOICE: Current Reviews for
Academic Libraries, Mar. 2016, p. 1070. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA445735616&it=r&asid=cb27f8ec38f15e5250d3251000262c1b. Accessed 4 Feb.
2017.
2/4/2017 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1486233171818 4/4
Gale Document Number: GALE|A445735616
"Perhaps his greatest legacy was his attempts to vote in the all-white Texas Democratic Primary, which led to important Supreme Court decisions: Nixon v. Herndon (1927) and Nixon v Condone (1932)," Guzmán said. "These two cases ultimately would be used as the legal precedent for the famous Smith v. Allwright (1944) case that banned all-white primaries throughout the South and allowed many African Americans to register and vote in many parts throughout the region."
Book review: Biographer hopes to increase the profile of El Paso's foremost voting rights pioneer
Ramón Rentería, ElPaso 2:04 p.m. MT June 6, 2015
None
CONNECT
TWEET
LINKEDIN
COMMENT
EMAIL
MORE
Will Guzmán suggests it is only fitting that Lawrence A. Nixon's life story is being published in 2015, the same year the United States celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act — signed into law in August 1965.
"The L.A. Nixon story is truly amazing for its courage, ideals, and commitment to the betterment of El Paso, the international border, and nation at large," Guzmán said in an email from Tallahassee, where he is an assistant professor of history and African-American studies at Florida A&M University.
Guzmán is the author of "Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands: Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon and Black Activism."
The biography of the El Paso physician and civil rights leader will be published June 15 by the University of Illinois Press.
"Perhaps his greatest legacy was his attempts to vote in the all-white Texas Democratic Primary, which led to important Supreme Court decisions: Nixon v. Herndon (1927) and Nixon v Condone (1932)," Guzmán said. "These two cases ultimately would be used as the legal precedent for the famous Smith v. Allwright (1944) case that banned all-white primaries throughout the South and allowed many African Americans to register and vote in many parts throughout the region."
Billed as one man's struggle against racial injustice in the American Southwest, "Civil Rights in the Texas Borderlands" is also described in the publisher's press materials as an "enlightening and powerful" book that explores "a seldom-studied corner of the Black past and the civil rights movement."
"Will Guzmán's gracefully written biography of Dr. Lawrence A. Nixon is a valuable addition to studies of the borderlands and the political and civil rights struggles of residents in underserved communities," Darlene Clark Hine, author of "Black Victory: The and Fall of the Texas White Primary," wrote in a blurb praising the book. "Guzmán adroitly opens a window onto the relations between African Americans, Mexican Americans, and Anglos while illuminating the challenges and barriers Dr. Nixon confronted as he labored to keep bodies well and hope alive."
Nixon had humble origins in Marshall, Texas, as the son of a former slave. He later graduated from Wiley College and Meharry Medical College.
He fled violence in Central Texas and settled in El Paso, where he established a successful medical practice that served a multiracial clientele from 1910 to 1963.
Guzmán hopes a broader audience will now become acquainted with other elements of Nixon's remarkable story, such as the establishment of El Paso branches of the NAACP (1914) and Southern Conference for Human Welfare (1945); efforts to desegregate El Paso's Washington Park and its public pools in the early 1920s; attempts to establish the Frederick Douglass National Tubercular Hospital in El Paso in the 1920s and 1930s; and Nixon's efforts to save Henry Lowry, an African-American sharecropper from Arkansas, from being lynched in 1921.
Guzmán began doing research on Nixon soon after he enrolled in 2000 in the history doctoral program at the University of Texas at El Paso. He also is associate director of the Carrie Meek-James Eaton Southeastern Regional Black Archives Research Center and Museum in Floria and a coauthor of "Landmarks and Legacies: A Guide to Tallahassee's African American Heritage."
Guzmán was not familiar with Nixon's story until after he met Maceo C. Dailey, director of UTEP's African American Studies program, while taking a graduate course in 1999 at Florida A&M University. Dailey encouraged him to enroll at UTEP.
"Outside of El Paso, the Nixon story is not widely known," he said. "I decided to take the chance on completing my doctoral studies at UTEP and work on the Nixon biography, a decision I have not come to regret."
Ramón Rentería is a retired El Paso Times reporter and columnist. He may be reached at rrenteria@elpasotimes.com.