Press Release: June 21, 2011

National Archives at Kansas City

National Archives to Host Historian Dr. Gregory Hospodor for Lee and Grant Speaker Series

For More Information Contact:
Kimberlee Ried, 816-268-8072

Kansas City, (MO)…On Tuesday, July 5, at 6:30 p.m. the National Archives will host historian and lecturer Dr. Gregory Hospodor for a lecture entitled Ulysses S. Grant Before the Civil War coinciding with the Lee and Grant exhibition. A 6:00 p.m. reception will precede the lecture.

When the Civil War began, no one imagined that Ulysses S. Grant would rise to command all United States armies. The low expectations were based upon Grant's decidedly lackluster pre-war career. Perhaps Grant's greatest pre-Civil war success came as an officer during the Mexican War. More frequent were the disappointments. Grant resigned his Army commission in 1854 and proved a poor businessman, at one point hawking firewood on the streets of Saint Louis in order to make ends meet. Through it all Grant persisted, a quality that would serve him well when circumstances changed. Opportunity beckoned in 1861. Grant possessed eleven years military experience and a West Point education, each a valuable commodity in a nation rushing toward war. This lecture will survey Grant's prewar life, focusing on the forces that shaped his character and prepared him to succeed as a military leader.

The exhibit Lee and Grant provides a major reassessment of the lives, careers, and historical impact of Civil War generals Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant. It also encourages audiences to move beyond the traditional mythology of both men and rediscover them within the context of their own time–based on their own words and those of their contemporaries. Lee and Grant presents photographs, paintings, prints, coins, reproduction clothing, accoutrements owned by the two men, documents written in their own hands, and biographical and historical records to reveal each man in his historical and cultural context, allowing audiences to compare the ways each has been remembered for almost 150 years.

About the speaker
Gregory S. Hospodor is an associate professor in the Department of Military History, United States Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. He is a graduate of the College of William and Mary, the University of Mississippi, and Louisiana State University, where he completed a dissertation on the Mexican War, 1846-1848. Since joining the CGSC faculty in 2008, Hospodor has served as, among other things, author of the Clausewitz and Jomini lessons in the College's military history curriculum, assistant director of the department's staff ride program, and a student advisor. The Department of Military History named him its Teacher of the Year for 2011.

For more information or to make a reservation for this free event call 816-268-8010 or email kansascity.educate@nara.gov.

Additional Information
Lee and Grant will be available for viewing at the National Archives at Kansas City, April 19, 2011 – October 22, 2011. To schedule a group tour or for additional information, call 816-268-8000 or visit www.archives.gov/central-plains/kansas-city.

Lee and Grant has been made possible by NEH on the Road, a special initiative of the National Endowment for the Humanities. The exhibit was originally developed by the Virginia Historical Society and co-curated by Dr. William M. S. Rasmussen, Lora M. Robins Curator of Art at the Virginia Historical Society and Dr. Robert S. Tilton, Chairman of the Department of English, University of Connecticut, Storrs. This exhibit is toured by Mid-America Arts Alliance through NEH on the Road. NEH on the Road offers an exciting opportunity for communities of all sizes to experience some of the best exhibitions funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). Mid-America Arts Alliance was founded in 1972 and is the oldest regional nonprofit arts organization in the United States. For more information, visit www.maaa.org or www.nehontheroad.org.

The National Archives at Kansas City is one of 13 facilities nationwide where the public has access to Federal archival records. It is home to more than 50,000 cubic feet of historical records dating from the 1820s to the 1990s created or received by nearly 100 Federal agencies. Serving the Central Plains Region, the archives holds records from the states of Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, and South Dakota. The facility is located at 400 West Pershing Road, Kansas City, MO 64108. It is open to the public Tuesday - Saturday from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. for research, with the exhibits open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information, call 816-268-8000 or visit us online.

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NREKA 11-78

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