but it can never forget what they did here. it is for us, the living rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. it is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation under god shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for

the people, shall not perish from the earth. [ applause ] s commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the civil war continues, join us every saturday and sunday at 6:00 and 10:00 a.m. for programs featuring the civil war. for more information about american history tv on cspan 3 including our complete schedule, go to cspan.org/history. and to keep up with us during the week or send us your questions and comments, follow us on twitter at twitter.com/cspan history. each year, time magazine selects a person who had the most influence on events during the previous 12 months.

if the same question were posed in 1862, who would "time" select as the person of the year? american history tv will be live next saturday from richmond, virginia, as historians, including james mcpherson and david blight, ponder that question and present their candidates for person of the year 1862. the museum of the confederacy and the library of virginia hosts the all-day forum. and during the day, we'll open our phone lines and take your tweets so you can question the historians about their nominations and propose your own candidates. live coverage begins at the:30 a.m. eastern to 4:30 p.m. eastern on american history tv on cspan 3. hosted by our time warner cable partner, american history tv recently visited beaumont, texas, to explore the history and literary culture of a city where the oil industry in texas got its start. for more information on our tour of six south central cities this

year, visit cspan.org/localcontent. gladys city as we refer to it here locally was built in 1976 for the bicentennial. and it is a recreation of the boomtown that was built when spindletop came in on january 10, 1901. by 1976, there was nothing left of what was the original gladys city, which was just across the highway from us, about half a mile. and so as a project for the bicentenni bicentennial, this group of people came together to try to preserve the history and memory of gladys city. gladys city is named for a young lady that was in the sunday school class of pa tilla higgins. he is one of our main characters. he was -- although he probably wouldn't have liked this, we call him our dreamer. he's the one that came up with a lot of the ideas for gladys city. and her name was gladys bingham. and she was in his sunday school

class, and he was very fond of her and kind of really bestowed an honor on her by naming the city for her. when it was originally -- when patillo originally envisioned the city, it was really what could be called an industrial utopia. by the time spindletop came in 1901, li like to say there was o more time to be perfect. and his other dreams really focused on this manufacturing part. and i think that's probably what some people wouldn't realize, is even they didn't know how much oil was under the ground out there. it surprised everybody when it came in. you know, beaumont at that time was kind of rough and tumble. and so he wanted something that was pristine and clean. and that's actually not what he got. but in the end. but that's the way it works

sometimes. the gladys city oil, gas, and manufacturing company was the first oil company incorporated in texas. and they are still in operation today. they still have interests out in spindletop field. and so they really put the engine behind trying to search for this oil. and we'll just go in and take a look at a couple of things. what patilla higgins' vision was for gladys city. so he can the cartographer, they plotted out the city and you can see that there was much given to gladys city oil, gas, and manufacturing company. there were places for homes and schools. and then what he believed would be the oilfields and manufacturing areas. if you look up here at the top, you'll see this is a picture of gladys as a child, gladys bingham. and then right next to it, you can see that the vision was more

about manufacturing in an industrial area than it was about oil production. i will say that after the lucas gusher came in, their stock certificates and letterhead changed very quickly to have the oil derricks out there in the oil field because their purpose changed very quickly when the well came in. >> why didn't this vision ever come to fruition? >> well, i think when you had so many people rushing in, and, you know, everybody wanted to make their dollar on this huge event that was coming, and if you think about it, especially in this area, just a few months prior was the big galveston hurricane in september of 1900. there were people -- a lot of people came from galveston when they heard about this because they were still trying to recover from that hurricane. and so this was a chance for people to come and set up businesses and -- or work in the field and try to make some money. now, it didn't -- as i've said,

it didn't turn out that way, to be this perfect city. this is a drawing that represents -- from a photograph that was done. and you'll see that it -- those buildings went up very quickly, and looked very much like what we have here today. >> was it a safe place to be? >> gladys city was -- i understand was fairly safe. there were people trying to make their money. there are honest people and there were dishonest people here. so you did have to watch out for card sharks and confidence men and things like that that would have tried to get money from you. you know, a lot of the men that came here probably came off of farms. and so, you know, they hadn't been in a city, even the size of beaumont. so they really had to be careful. that was gladys city out on spindletop hill, where you were really in the middle of the oil field. it could probably get very rough.

there are stories that it could get rowdy and, you know, people did lose their lives a couple of times because, you know, just through fights and that kind of thing. so it was more the wild section. and then gladys city was kind of off away from the actual oil field. beaumont had its own oil exchange or stock exchange at the time. so this building represents that stock exchange. there were over 600 oil companies that were incorporated after the big boom. and when the gusher came in. and so the trading floor -- the actual building was probably much larger than this to accommodate the trading floor. this picture up here gives you some idea of what the original looked like. so they would be trading stock in the front. in the back of the building, you had a print shop that was

printing stocks just as quickly as they could for all of these oil companies. and, you know, some of that stock was good, and some was not good. but i was talking to a printer the other day, and, you know, that's not the printer's job to decide. so they were churning it out as quickly as they could. so while all of these buildings are replicas, they do represent actual businesses that were operating at the time in gladys city. and for instance, this is gibson's dry goods store. and this is where you would have come to get clothing or your sewing needs, that kind of thing. now many women still made their own clothes at that time. they would purchase their undergarments and that kind of thing, but you could purchase -- most men at this time would come in and purchase their shirts. and you could actually buy jeans, denim jeans, to wear to work.

and the ha probably had, you know, a day dress. maybe one sunday dress. and then same thing for men. they would have had their work clothes, and then probably one and then of course they would have had to get their starched collars to go with that shirt. now, if you had a little more money, you would, you know, have a derby hat orat to wear to church or to nicer functions. i would be surprised about how much some of these pieces actually cost back then. for instance, you know, on a cold day in january, you would have had to have your union suit, which is like a tighter fitting pair of what we now call long johns. but for $2 or $3, men or women could get their union suits.

this is a copy of the sears & r row buk -- roebuck catalog from just before the boom. this is what people would have been ordering either through the dry goods store. people could order just about anything from the sears and roebuck. or you could probably go to the general store and then have it shipped in on the train. everything i have read about patilla higgins and what motivated him was to be somebody. i think he had a real need to find his place in history, and to do big things and to do great things. and sometimes he made it. even later in life, he continued to wildcat for oil. going out to all over texas, to find new well sites. many of them are still producing

today that he found. and spent most of his life trying to convince people in different parts of texas that for sure there was oil. so he was on a -- i would almost call it a personal crusade to be believed, to be taken seriously, about his ideas and to be respected. so while most of our collection fits within, you know, the late 1890s, early 1900s, we do dip a bit into the 1920s and 30s with two really special pieces. for instance, this is a 31 -- 1931 model a ford that belonged to patilla higgins. he drove it for nearly 25 years after he drove his model t for over 25 years. so he drove this car all over texas as he continued to search

for oil and wildcat different wells all throughout the state. i believe it's not on there anymore, but he actually had the steering wheel modified, you know, because patilla only had one arm. he actually lost an arm in a fight with a sheriff's deputy. you know, we talk about patilla being a big dreamer, but in hiss younger days he was a little bit of what would have been called a rounder. he liked to get into fights. he liked to carry guns and shoot guns. and one night, he got into quite a scrape with a deputy sheriff. shot and actually killed the sheriff, and in the process was shot in the arm and lost his arm. he did go on trial for -- but was acquitted of the murder. and not soon after, he did begin to turn his life around. the story goes that one of the

tent revivals was in town. and after going to the revival, he converted and actually became a sunday school teacher and then went on to become the kind of the patilla that we know. he came back up in beaumont probably right around 1951 for the 50th anniversary. and by that time, i believe he was 81, in his early 80s. he was about 88, i think, when he passed away. so he got to see the full stretch of all of the different things that happened at spindletop over his lifetime. the spindletop field began to play out after about three or four years. the production started really dropping. so, you know, gladys city kind of remained out there, and people still began to build housing, especially here in south beaumont. then by the late 1920s, we had the second boom, what's called

the yont lee boom. and with new technology, they came and drilled on the perimeter of the salt dome, which is what spindletop -- the hill was at one time. and so that caused a second boom that brought new life to gladys city and to beaumont. then that kind of waned, and by the 1950s, companies were mining sulfur out at spindletop. and after that, that's when it kind of dwindled away and people -- there was really no major production out there. the booms were over. people began moving away, moving into beaumont. and gladys city just kind of deteriorated. by the 1960s, there were some efforts to create a museum and make sure that things were being preserved. and then by the mid '70s, when they decided to build the replica gladys city.

hi, i'm mark farkus. we have three local content vehicles. the purpose of the vehicles is to collect programming from outside of washington, d.c. how do we do did? we staff each one of these with one person, with a small video camera and a laptop editor so they are able to roll, record, produce, and edit things from the road. so that's what we're doing with the lcvs. why i want to do this is to get outside of washington, d.c., and collect programming for all of our stations. we will descend on different cities with three vehicles. one will do historic programming, one book programming, and the third community projects. the last thing that's important to know is all of this not only goes on the air but it gets archived on our website. the cspan video library. and what we are also doing in these cities is doing extensive

social media. you'll see us on facebook. our cable partners on facebook. you'll see four square, which is really location based to tell people where we are going. you'll see us on twitter as well. it's a chance to get out our message not only on air, but also online and through social mo media as well. that's why it's important. we want to get outside of washington, d.c., get into places we don't normally do programming, and make a commitment to get outside of the beltway to produce programming for all of the cspan networks. >> the next stop, shreveport, louisiana, the first weekend in march on cspan's 2 book tv and american history tv on cspan 3. there's a new website for american history tv where you can find our schedules and preview our upcoming programs. watch featured video from our regular weekly series, as well as access ahtv's history tweets, history in the news and social media from facebook, twitter,

media, and four square. follow american history tv all weekend, every weekend, on cspan 3 and online at cspan.org/history. join american history tv on monday for 24 hours of america's first ladies, including an interview with eleanor roosevelt at 4:45 p.m. eastern. >> i think like everything else that we started out expecting that the united nations would solve every difficulty just by nations. >> tour the white house private quarters with laura bush at 5:00. and lady bird johnson at 8:00. nancy reagan reminisces about her husband at 8:30. and at 11:30, the only first lady to run for president, now secretary of state hillary clinton, at her final campaign rally in 2008. american history tv monday, president's day, on cspan 3. lisa kathleen graty is the

curator for women's political history here at the smithsonian. so when you were putting together this latest exhibit, how did you decide how the gowns would be placed? and what it would say about the history and the role of these first ladies? >> well, we picked a series partly just based on what we thought was pretty, and what hadn't been out in a while. sometimes it's nice to be the curator. you get to just choose things. we also wanted an array of color and array of different styles. it's not chronological, so we wanted to maximize the space in the case and really maximize the look of each style and color of each dress against each other to make a more pleasing picture. and i think that putting things that are far apart in time next to each other as opposed to a slow progression, you really see the amazing difference between, say, lucy hayes, that dress with the bustle and the very tight you're not going to raise your arm above your waist.

an amazing difference that these were chronological, so far apart you wouldn't be able to see them. >> we tried to put things out that haven't been up in a while. are there gowns and items that are back in storage? >> there are some things that are back in storage that hopefully will come out in time. one of the ideas is that we can change things out here. if you're not doing every first lady, eases the pressure on the dresses. trying to make them survive as long as possible. and some of them have been standing around for 100 years. so, they need to rest, be out of light. and this allows us to change things around. it also specifically allows some thing that is haven't been seen before to be seen by the people. we have more in the collection than the gowns that i think -- i always think of them as being

the -- specimen gowns, everyone expects to see for each first lady. sometimes we have others and those are interesting, too. >> a lot of fanfare goes into giving up the dress. how did that come about? >> that is -- has also been a changing tradition. people always think the exhibit looked one way. actually about nine different shows, it's been changing. people think that the gown presentation always happened one way. in reality, it didn't really start until lady bird johnson. the tradition was, mass dresses to create the show. that happened, just sort of a big bolt the first time. they would ask each first lady and the ones to fill in the blanks for a dress. now, helen taft got interested in the exhibition. she was the first lady at the time and she contributed her 1909 inaugural gown. so, she set sort of the tradition of giving your inaugural gown. every first lady since then who has had an inaugural ball has

given her inaugural gown. has anyone ever refused or balked at the idea? >> i don't think anyone has ever refused, but edith roosevelt, who we'll see around the corner, we'll also see her inaugural gown, she didn't have a lot of patience for this. she was not first lady at the time. but she said she didn't save clothing, that she cut it up and made other things out of it. so, she did not donate anything to the collection. her daughter, however, later did. and what she donated was the inaugural gown. but mrs. roosevelt wasn't kidding. the bodice had been removed from the dress. >> does that give us context at the time that that was a traditional, normal thing to do? >> mrs. roosevelt said she liked to cut them up and satin gowns or silk gowns made tea gowns. it may have been a quirk of hers that she remade clothes. >> there were examples of other

types of gowns here. it seems on every occasion we're looking to see what they're wearing. >> i think, one, it's become sort of a red carpet culture that likes to look and analyze what people are wearing. there's always been an interest in first lady's fashion. people were interested in what martha washington was wearing. i think it's because we look to these clothes. we don't -- currently we probably have more exposure to the first lady and we still don't know her. most of us will never meet the first lady. so we have to figure her out based on these little clues, snippets of interviews, what she's wearing, what she served for dinner, how she entertains. we piece all that together to get an idea. the causes she promotes.

we piece all that together to create a rounded view, our own view of the first lady. >> yet they're supposed to represent a sort of presidential style, if you will. if you can, explain what you think that means. and then which first lady didn't meet public expectations when it came to that, and which ones were really praised for their style? >> i think the first lady sets the tone, the style and demeanor and tone of the presidency. she picks the china. she arranges entertainments. she's the one that sets the feeling. she's also the more accessible probably partner in the presidency. so she has to decide. i can't imagine how daunts it would be to have to face your first state dinner. and they need to set a tone. and if they deviate that much, they did people like it or not like it and the white house has ebbed and flowed between very elegant and more casual and as the country's changed, also the

style has changed. and people have reacted differently each way. how do you command respect for a new nation, a fledgling nation, but not look like a monarchy. you've got to step away from that. so how do you balance that? what's casual, what was washington. who was criticized. who really hit it out of the park and met expectations. >> i think dolly madison is the

first amazing social first lady. she was the go to -- she had decorum, but there was a little bit of casual informal and none. if you had a card of introduction you could come to ms. madison's weekly crushes. people mixed and talked. it was said you couldn't tell who her friends and enemies were. because she treated everyone the same. some first ladies have been less successful, sometimes they were awkward in the job, because their tastes were not the country's taste. nancy reagan came in to make a much more formal, what she thought more appropriate white house.

she got some push back for tin crease in formality. but when, as that went on, people began to admire what the reagans were doing in terms of the tone of the white house. >> so does the criticism, the praise sort of reflect the policies of the time, the culture of the time, maybe the public polling of the president at the time. >> i think it reflects popular culture. we do expect a higher standard of the white house, we know it's not our house, we know that it is a more formal style, but it can't seem to formal, it can't seem too ostentatious. it can't be show. >> like eleanor roosevelt's dress for example, or another dress that comes to mind, maybe. >> i think they're all pretty

representative of their time period. i think eleanor roosevelt really reflects that period of time. she's walking a line, because at the first inaugural ball, it's during the depression, she has to look elegant and appropriate. that is an elegant, simple dress. you could visualize yourself in that dress. i think most people could look at the pictures of her and see that they -- this was something that they could relate to. jacqueline kennedy, this is the dress from her first state dinner. jacqueline kennedy is more shaping fashions. that really speaks to the formality of the new look and the 50s.

and if you look at something like the flapper dresses, actually nancy reagan's wonderful suit. when you look at that, you know it's the 1980s. they want to be appropriate for the occasion, appropriate for their age and appropriate for the circumstance. and appropriate as a symbol of the united states. even when she's not in duty hours, she represents the united states. >> we will have two photo opportunities, the first is for the still photographers and then that will be followed by the television camera.