Gone to Texas: a History of the Lone Star State.

Gone to Texas: A History of the Lone Star State. By Randolph B. Campbell. (Oxford and other cities: Oxford University Press, 2003. Pp. xii, 500. Paper, $29.95, ISBN 0-19-523843-0; cloth, $35.00, ISBN 0-19-513842-2.)

During the 1830s and 1840s, hundreds of Americans posted "Gone to Texas," or simply "GTT," on their homesteads and headed for Texas (p. ix). Since that time, thousands from other states and nations have joined in the move to the Lone Star state. Randolph B. Campbell, a graduate of the University of Virginia, came to Texas as a faculty member at North Texas State University (now the University of North Texas) in the mid-1960s. Since that time, he has been a prolific author of books and articles describing his adopted state. Beginning with the publication (with coauthor Richard G. Lowe) of Wealth and Power in Antebellum Texas (College Station, 1977) and more recently of Sam Houston and the American Southwest (New York, 1993) and GrassRoots Reconstruction in Texas, 1865-1880 (Baton Rouge, 1997), Campbell has demonstrated that he is a diligent researcher and a skillful writer. His latest work, Gone to Texas, is a splendid example of his superb craftsmanship.

Simply put, Gone to Texas is the finest one-volume account of Texas history ever written. While it may lack some of the dramatic style and literary flair of T. R. Fehrenbach's Lone Star: A History of Texas and the Texans (New York, 1968), Campbell's work is vastly superior in terms of balance, factual content, and completeness. Written in a clear, crisp style and based upon a thorough knowledge and use of late-twentieth-century historical scholarship, Gone to Texas will appeal to both the specialist and the general reader.

While Campbell avoids excessive claims for Texas accomplishments and uniqueness, he still captures the spirit of adventure, boldness, conflict, and energy that has characterized the history of the state and its people. Campbell emphasizes (correctly, I believe) the nineteenth-century development of Texas. Eight of the book's sixteen chapters describe events between 1821 (the year of Mexican independence from Spain) and 1891 (the inauguration of James Stephen Hogg as governor and the beginning of an era of reform). The first four chapters describe the first Texans, exploration and adventure, and Spanish rule in Texas. The final four chapters cover late-nineteenth- and twentieth-century developments. A brief conclusion describes Texas in the twenty-first century.

Campbell devotes much attention to the impact of immigration upon the development of Texas. He shows how the rapid influx of Anglo-American immigrants led to the breaking of ties with Mexico, the creation of an independent republic, and eventual statehood. Separate chapters are devoted to the antebellum frontier and to the growth of southern economic and social institutions in Texas during early statehood. In the chapters on the Civil War and Reconstruction, Campbell describes the high price the state paid for its inability to solve the issues of slavery and race without war. Rejecting the old, traditional interpretation of Reconstruction, Campbell points out that "the era contributed heavily to the popular opposition to taxing and spending for public purposes and to the general lack of concern for civil rights that characterized the state's politics after the 1870s" (p. 289). In a chapter overlapping political reconstruction and the Gilded Age, Campbell notes that Texas "became a part of both the Old West and the New South" in the period between 1865 and 1890 (p. 291). As such, it shared in the hopes and frustrations of both regions.

Clear maps and photographs complement the text. While there are no footnotes or endnotes, a chapter-by-chapter select bibliography refers readers to additional books on Texas history.

This is a splendid volume that many will wish they had written. Of course, in any work of this type and magnitude, individual readers will have their own views of specific aspects of the book. This reviewer wishes that at least a few scholarly articles (including those by Campbell himself) were included in the bibliography. Also, it is regretted that Campbell did not always identify by name the historians he quotes, rather than indicating simply "one historian says" or "has written." But these are small criticisms of an outstanding piece of historical scholarship. All Texans and all those interested in the history of the state are indebted to Campbell for his work.

Lamar University 

RALPH A. WOOSTER