North Louisiana History is an academic journal

Academic journal

An academic journal is a peer-reviewed periodical in which scholarship relating to a particular academic discipline is published. Academic journals serve as forums for the introduction and presentation for scrutiny of new research, and the critique of existing research...

 published twice annually in Shreveport

Shreveport, Louisiana

Shreveport is the third largest city in Louisiana. It is the principal city of the fourth largest metropolitan area in the state of Louisiana and is the 109th-largest city in the United States....

, Louisiana

Louisiana

Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...

 by the North Louisiana Historical Association

North Louisiana Historical Association

The North Louisiana Historical Association was organized in 1952 to in its own words "encourage an appreciation and understanding of the history of North Louisiana."-History:...

 (NLHA).

History

The origin of North Louisiana History parallels the history of the NLHA itself, which was organized in 1952 at Methodist-affiliated Centenary College

Centenary College of Louisiana

Centenary College of Louisiana is a primarily undergraduate, liberal arts and sciences college in Shreveport, Louisiana. The college is one of the founding members of the Associated Colleges of the South, a pedagogical organization consisting of sixteen Southern liberal arts colleges...

 in Shreveport.

The NLHA founding members included Mrs. D. H. Perkins and Dr. A. W. Shaw. The organization awards the Overdyke Awards for its best published research paper in memory of W. Darrell Overdyke, a Centenary College history professor. With time, the associational publications became more formal, and the NLHA became a non-profit organization

Non-profit organization

Nonprofit organization is neither a legal nor technical definition but generally refers to an organization that uses surplus revenues to achieve its goals, rather than distributing them as profit or dividends...

. The NLHA seeks to collect and preserve historical material about North Louisiana and under editorial review considers articles for publication from professional historians, lay historians, and students. According to the historian B. H. Gilley, formerly of the Louisiana Tech University

Louisiana Tech University

Louisiana Tech University, often referred to as Louisiana Tech, LA Tech, or Tech, is a coeducational public research university located in Ruston, Louisiana. Louisiana Tech is designated as a Tier 1 school in the national universities category by the 2012 U.S. News & World Report college rankings...

 faculty, "a wealth of research has been written and preserved in [the NLHA] publications".

North Louisiana Historical Association bulletin

A bulletin was edited from 1956 to 1958 by J. A. Manry (1903-1993). Manry was a journalist, regional scholar, and an historian. Other names for the Bulletin that might be found in citations are:

• Bulletin (North Louisiana Historical Association) (the uniform title)
• North Louisiana Historical Association bulletin
• North Louisiana Historical Association Bulletin
• Bulletin of the North Louisiana Historical Association
• The Bulletin
• Bulletin

North Louisiana Historical Association news letter

From 1959 to 1969, NLHA published a newsletter. The editor was Max Bradbury, who with the Bradbury Award is still recognized annually for the "most outstanding article" published in North Louisiana History. Names for the newsletter that might be cited are:

• Newsletter (North Louisiana Historical Association) (this is the uniform title)
• North Louisiana Historical Association Newsletter
• North Louisiana Historical Association news letter
• Newsletter

Journal of the North Louisiana Historical Association

Beginning in the Fall of 1969, Morgan D. Peoples

Morgan D. Peoples

Morgan Dewey Peoples was a historian who coauthored with Michael L. Kurtz the definitive biography of the late Louisiana Governor Earl Kemp Long. Peoples was a member of the Louisiana Tech University at Ruston history department faculty from 1965 until his retirement in 1985...

 of Ruston

Ruston, Louisiana

Ruston is a city in and the parish seat of Lincoln Parish, Louisiana, United States. The population was 20,546 at the 2000 census. Ruston is near the eastern border of the Ark-La-Tex and is the home of Louisiana Tech University. Its economy caters to its college population...

, then a member of the Louisiana Tech History Department, became the editor and founded the journal. Under the original title, Journal of the North Louisiana Historical Association, the journal was published quarterly from 1969 through 1998. This journal is cited under a number of similar titles:

• Journal (North Louisiana Historical Association) (the uniform title)
• Journal of the North Louisiana Historical Association
• North Louisiana Historical Association journal
• Journal / North La. Hist. Assoc
• J North La Hist Assoc
• Journal
• Journal - North Louisiana Historical Association

North Louisiana History

Ending with Volume 29, No. 4 (Fall 1998) and beginning with Volume 30, No. 1 (Winter 1999), the journal was retitled North Louisiana History.

Today

The publication is currently edited by Emilia Gay Griffith Means, a retired history professor at Louisiana State University in Shreveport

Louisiana State University in Shreveport

Louisiana State University in Shreveport is a branch of the Louisiana State University System in Shreveport, Louisiana. Opened in 1967, LSUS is the only public four-year university in the Shreveport-Bossier metro area....

. The printing press for the journal is named in honor of the late Louisiana Tech professor and regional historian John Ardis Cawthon

John Ardis Cawthon

John Ardis Cawthon was an educator and regional historian from Ruston in Lincoln Parish in north Louisiana, who was affiliated with Louisiana Tech University from 1939–1940, 1948, and from January 12, 1954, until retirement on May 31, 1972...

.

The journal accepts articles for possible publication which focus on any part of Louisiana north of and including Alexandria

Alexandria, Louisiana

Alexandria is a city in and the parish seat of Rapides Parish, Louisiana, United States. It lies on the south bank of the Red River in almost the exact geographic center of the state. It is the principal city of the Alexandria metropolitan area which encompasses all of Rapides and Grant parishes....

. An index of articles published between 1970 and 2005 is available online. In addition to its scholarly articles, the journal recently began accepting personal reminiscences and essays relative to regional history, an art that Cawthon particularly pioneered during the 1970s.

Louisiana State University in Shreveport

Louisiana State University in Shreveport

Louisiana State University in Shreveport is a branch of the Louisiana State University System in Shreveport, Louisiana. Opened in 1967, LSUS is the only public four-year university in the Shreveport-Bossier metro area....

 (LSUS) supports the journal with office space and a dedicated library collection as part of the LSUS Archives and Special Collections at the Noel Memorial Library, including an online list of journal articles. As of 1970, and still today, Centenary College holds an archive of historical NLHA material. Starting in 1970, articles published in the journal have been abstracted and cited in
America, history and life, Historical abstracts. Part A. Modern history abstracts, and Historical abstracts. Part B. Twentieth century abstracts.

Selected topics in the journal

Among the hundreds of topics covered in North Louisiana History are James B. Aswell, Gene Austin

Gene Austin

Gene Austin was an American singer and songwriter, one of the first "crooners". His 1920s compositions "When My Sugar Walks Down the Street" and "The Lonesome Road" became pop and jazz standards.-Career:...

, Barksdale Air Force Base

Barksdale Air Force Base

Barksdale Air Force Base is a United States Air Force base located approximately east-southeast of Bossier City, Louisiana.The host unit at Barksdale is the 2d Bomb Wing , the oldest Bomb Wing in the Air Force. It is assigned to the Air Force Global Strike Command's Eighth Air Force...

, Sam Caldwell

Sam Caldwell

Samuel Shepherd Caldwell, known as Sam Caldwell , was an oilman who served as the Democratic mayor of Shreveport, Louisiana, from 1934-1946....

, Claire Chennault, L. L. Clover

L. L. Clover

Leander Louis Clover, known as L. L. Clover , was an American Baptist Association clergyman who in 1952 established Louisiana Missionary Baptist Institute and Seminary in Minden, Louisiana...

, Monroe E. Dodd

Monroe E. Dodd

Monroe Elmon Dodd, Sr. was an American Southern Baptist clergyman who was a pioneer radio preacher, the pastor of the First Baptist Church of Shreveport, Louisiana, the founder of the former Dodd College for Girls, and served as the Southern Baptist Convention President from 1934-1935...

, William Edenborn

William Edenborn

William Edenborn was a businessman, inventor and philanthropist, born in Altena in the Westphalia region of the Ruhr River Valley of the former Prussia, since Germany...

, John D. Ewing

John D. Ewing

John Dunbrack Ewing, Sr. , was a Louisiana journalist who served as editor and publisher of both the Shreveport Times and the Monroe News-Star-World from 1931 until his death. He was also affiliated with radio station KWKH in Shreveport, the seat of Caddo Parish in northwestern Louisiana...

, James C. Gardner

James C. Gardner

James Creswell Gardner, I, known as Jim Gardner , was a power company executive best known as the mayor of Shreveport, Louisiana, who served a single term from 1954-1958....

, Germantown Colony and Museum

Germantown Colony and Museum

Germantown Colony and Museum is an historical preservation project north of Minden in Webster Parish in northwestern Louisiana, USA. It was among three sites in Louisiana founded by former members of the Utopian Movement called the Harmony Society in the early 19th century...

, Josiah Gregg

Josiah Gregg

Josiah Gregg was a merchant, explorer, naturalist, and author of the American Southwest and Northern Mexico regions. He is most famous for his book Commerce of the Prairies.-Early years:...

, Henry E. Hardtner

Henry E. Hardtner

Henry Ernest Hardtner was a Louisiana businessman and conservationist regarded as "the father of forestry in the South." He founded and named the town of Urania in La Salle Parish and served single terms as a Democrat in both houses of the Louisiana State Legislature...

, Robert F. Kennon

Robert F. Kennon

Robert Floyd Kennon, Sr., known as Bob Kennon , was the 48th Governor of Louisiana, serving from 1952-1956. He failed to win a second non-consecutive term in the 1963 Democratic primary....

, Kisatchie National Forest

Kisatchie National Forest

Kisatchie National Forest, the only National forest in Louisiana, USA, is located in the state's old growth piney hills and hardwood bottoms of seven central and northern parishes. It totals more than of public lands....

, John S. Kyser

John S. Kyser

John Schenebly Kyser was an American historian and geographer who served as the president of Northwestern State University in Natchitoches, Louisiana, from 1954-1966.-Background:...

, Lake Bistineau

Lake Bistineau

250px|right|thumb|Lake Bistineau south of [[Doyline, Louisiana|Doyline]], [[Louisiana]]Lake Bistineau is a long, narrow waterway of , wide and long located in Webster, Bossier, and Bienville parishes in northwestern Louisiana. The lake is fed by Dorcheat Bayou, Clark’s Bayou, and other smaller...

, Earl Kemp Long, Huey Pierce Long, Jr., Walter M. Lowrey

Walter M. Lowrey

Walter M. Lowrey was an historian affiliated with Centenary College, a Methodist-institution in Shreveport, Louisiana, who was also a founding member of the Louisiana Historical Association....

, Garnie W. McGinty

Garnie W. McGinty

Garnie William McGinty was an historian whose career was principally based for thirty-five years at Louisiana Tech University in Ruston, Louisiana.-Biography:...

, Francis T. Nicholls

Francis T. Nicholls

Francis Redding Tillou Nicholls was an American attorney, politician, judge, and a brigadier general in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War...

, Otto Passman

Otto Passman

Otto Ernest Passman was a conservative Democratic congressman from Monroe in northeastern Louisiana, who served from 1947 to 1977. He is primarily remembered for his detailed knowledge and mostly opposition to foreign aid...

, Rupert Peyton

Rupert Peyton

Rupert Rudolph Peyton was an anti-Long member of the Louisiana House of Representatives from Shreveport, the seat of Caddo Parish, having served at-large for a single four-year term from 1932-1936...

, A. T. Powers

A. T. Powers

Austin Toliver Powers, known as A. T. Powers , was a leading figure from the 1930s to the 1970s in the theologically conservative American Baptist Association, based in Texarkana, Texas...

, Robert Russ

Robert Russ

Robert Edwin Russ was a planter and civic leader who founded Ruston, the parish seat of Lincoln Parish in north Louisiana.-Early life:...

, Henry Miller Shreve

Henry Miller Shreve

Henry Miller Shreve was the American inventor and steamboat captain who opened the Mississippi, Ohio and Red rivers to steamboat navigation. Shreveport, Louisiana, is named in his honor....

, Joe Gray Taylor

Joe Gray Taylor

Joe Gray Taylor was a historian of the American South who published fifteen essays and eight books, including Louisiana: a Bicentennial History...

, Joe D. Waggonner, Don W. Williamson

Don W. Williamson

Donald Wayne Williamson, usually known as Don Williamson , is a semiretired American businessman in Shreveport, the seat of Caddo Parish and the largest city in north Louisiana, who served in both houses of the Louisiana State Legislature between 1968 and 1980...

, Earl Williamson

Earl Williamson

Earl Guyton Williamson, Sr. was a prominent businessman and politician in northern Caddo Parish, Louisiana, from the 1930s until the 1970s...

, James Whitfield Williamson

James Whitfield Williamson

James Whitfield Williamson was a businessman and politician from north Caddo Parish in northwestern Louisiana, the scion of a prominent political family...

, and Henry Wirz

Henry Wirz

Heinrich Hartmann Wirz better known as Henry Wirz was a Confederate officer in the American Civil War...

.