Southeastern NEWS

                                                       Southeastern Louisiana University
                                           Public Information Office
                                           publicinfo@selu.edu
                                           SLU 880, Hammond, LA 70402
                                           504/549-2341/fax 504-549-2061
    Date: 4/13/00
      Contact:                           Christina Chapple 18

AUTHOR TO PRESENT LECTURES FOR REVAMPED SOUTHEAST LOUISIANA
HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION
     HAMMOND -- Southeastern Louisiana University and the Southeast Louisiana
Historical Association will sponsor two lectures on April 27 by noted historian and author Gene
Smith of Texas Christian University.
     Smith, an authority on early American history, will present the Southeast Louisiana
Historical Association Lectures at 11 a.m. at Southeastern's Vonnie Borden Theatre and at 6 p.m.
at Zemurray Gardens, east of Independence.
     Sam Hyde Jr., director of Southeastern's Center for Regional Studies, said the topic for
Smith's morning lecture on campus will be "Chasing Slavers, Smugglers and Privateers: Thomas
ap Gatesby Jones and U.S. Authority on the Gulf of Mexico, 1808-1815." The presentation is
free and open to the public, he said.
     Hyde said the dinner meeting at Zemurray Garden heralds the reactivation of the
Southeast Louisiana Historical Association. As keynote speaker, Smith will talk on
"Remembering the Battle of New Orleans: Arsene Lacarriere Latour's 'Historical memoir of the
War in West Florida and Louisiana in 1814-15.'" Smith edited Latour's memoir in 1999.
     Smith is the author of "Thomas ap Gatesby Jones: Commodore of Manifest Destiny";
"Filibusters and Expansionists: Jeffersonian Manifest Destiny, 1800-1812"; "Iron and Heavy
Guns: Duel Between the Monitor and Merrimac" and "For the Purposes of Defense: The Politics
of the Jeffersonian Gunboat Program."
     For additional information on the lectures and the Southeast Louisiana Historical
Association, contact the Center for Regional Studies at 504-549-2151.
                             -SLU-
Press release available online at www.selu.edu/NewsEvents/PublicInfoOffice/newsp00.htm