Upcoming Exhibits

Frontier Forts and the Clash of Cultures on the Texas Frontier
Battle of the Little Wichita. Kiowa chief Kicking Bird's last raid into Texas in 1870 engaged a contingent of 6th Cavalry from Fort Richardson. Painting by Nola Davis, courtesy of Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.
Battle of the Little Wichita. Kiowa chief Kicking Bird's last raid into Texas in 1870 engaged a contingent of 6th Cavalry from Fort Richardson. Painting by Nola Davis, courtesy of Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.

Our upcoming exhibit on Texas Beyond History will tell these and other stories, placing them in the context of the larger drama that attended a half-century of warfare between two ways of life that ultimately could not exist in the same land. In the next few months, a team of historians, archeologists, architectural historians, artists, and professional educators will create a compelling series of exhibits and teachers' resources that will tell the dramatic story of Texas' frontier forts. Period photos—some never seen before—as well as maps, rare documents, and colorful images will vividly illustrate this remarkable time in Texas' past.

Scattered across the state from the Red River to the Rio Grande are the remnants of what was once a formidable military presence on the frontier—Texas' nineteenth-century forts. Some are ghostly ruins, others have been painstakingly reconstructed to evoke a sense of the lives that played out inside their walls. But these architectural artifacts are more than the nostalgic representatives of a romanticized period of American history. They are the visible reminders of the especially violent cultural conflict that erupted as the lines of white settlement moved westward across the state into the domain of the Kiowas, Comanches, and other Plains Indians. The forts and the frontier served as a proving ground for such great military commanders as Robert E. Lee and Quanah Parker. Buffalo hunters, gamblers, and entrepreneurs plied the scabtowns nearby.

Ruins of Fort Griffin at sunset. Photo courtesy of Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.
Ruins of Fort Griffin at sunset. Photo courtesy of Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.

Second lieutenants at Fort Clark, 1878. Photograph courtesy of Lawrence T. Jones III.
Second lieutenants at Fort Clark, 1878. Photograph courtesy of Lawrence T. Jones III.

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8 March 2002
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