In the same way that the little black girl, Gwendolyn, has been removed from Crisp’s history, figures that missed out on one of the stages of the making of history get left behind. But when figures with perspectives that differ from the majority are left out, that’s a perspective that the people of the future miss out on, and so we end up with the history that the rich white men have written. It’s the same problem with most of history– their perspective is seen as of little consequence compared to the men who believe they are making history, and so it becomes lost. To anyone looking back, from historians to the average student in a history class, this is such a loss when you’re trying to look into the time period. Such misconceptions get printed and perpetuated until myth mixes with history to the point that no one knows the difference anymore.
This is why Crisp is such an advocate of rediscovering these covered up voices. Pena could have enlightened generations as to what really happened at the Alamo, but he was shut out and so not read or thought about for decades at a time. Any mention of Juan Seguin, or any of the other Tejanos, could have clarified the role of Tejanos and Mexicans in the Revolution, but they passed by the wayside as the Alamo story was popularized and the stories of the revolution became tales of good vs evil in terms of Anglos versus Mexicans.
Our image of the Revolution could have been dramatically changed, as a nation looking back and as well as any individual, had these voices remained for all to hear. Maybe then such a dramatic dichotomy between the sides of the war would not have been created. Crisp insists that racism was not the main element behind the Revolution and the hate mail that came from people a century later to writers that ‘attacked’ their long held views, but it was still an element. This is interesting, as one considers if that hate mail might never have come if only the voices of Tejanos and Mexicans had been allowed to survive. That becomes even more of a possibility if the Disney version of Davy Crockett could somehow change to allow less of said dichotomy as well, as that is the image that seemed to stick most into people’s heads. That was the image that people saw as disrespected when writers point out inaccuracies in Crockett’s presumed death scene.
If men like Juan Seguin showed up in that Disneyland special, what are the chances that writers like Crisp would be receiving hate mail on the topics of their papers and books?
We as Americans may never know, but can only hope to try and keep such silencing from happening in the present, so voices like those men’s can be heard in the future.