Dr. Chris Mackowski, professor of Journalism and Mass Communication, gave a Civil War tour of New Orleans’s French Quarter in July as part of the American Battlefield Trust’s annual Teacher Institute for K-12 teachers. 

He also twice-presented a talk, “A Place for Liberty? James Longstreet and the Battle of Liberty Place,” which focused on an attempt by white supremacists to overthrow a duly elected biracial government in Louisiana in 1874. Longstreet was a former Confederate officer living in New Orleans who led that state militia’s attempts to defend the government.

Later in July, Mackowski presented a program, “The Lay of the Land: How Topography Influenced the Way Soldiers Moved Across Battlefields,” for a virtual Teacher Institute presented by the Trust. He also interviewed Susan Eisenhower, granddaughter of the former president, as part of that online event. 

In August, Mackowski celebrated the 10th anniversary of the Emerging Civil War Symposium (ECW), which he co-founded. ECW promotes emerging voices in the field of Civil War public history.

Photo: Mackowski, left, and Dr. Curt Fields as General Ulysses S. Grant in front of the historic Massaponax Church in Spotsylvania, Virginia.