From June 17–20, 2013, forty-eight classroom teachers from around Texas gathered on The University of Texas at El Paso campus for "America at War in the Twentieth Century," an institute examining American military conflicts after 1900. Topics covered included the Spanish American War, World War I, American isolationism and neutrality between the wars, World War II, Latinos and African Americans in World War II, the origins of the Cold War, the Truman Doctrine, and the wars in Korea and Vietnam.
The institute keynote presentation was delivered by George C. Herring of the University of Kentucky, author of From Colony to Superpower: U.S. Foreign Relations since 1776 (Oxford History of the United States).
The institute faculty also featured Senate Historian Emeritus Richard A. Baker; Maggie Rivas-Rodriguez and Mark Atwood Lawrence of The University of Texas at Austin; Doran Cart of the National World War I Museum; Stephen M. Duffy of Texas A&M International University; Matthew Dallek of the University of California Washington Center; Joy Rohde of Trinity University; and UTEP scholars Brad Cartwright, Maceo C. Dailey Jr., David Hackett, and Jeffrey P. Shepherd.
Adair Margo, founder of the Tom Lea Institute, gave a lunchtime presentation on Lea's work as an artist-correspondent for Life magazine in the Pacific theatre during World War II. Education specialist Tara Carlisle of the University of North Texas Libraries also gave a lunchtime presentation on educational resources available via the Portal to Texas History.
