WHARTON COUNTY JUNIOR COLLEGE – IN-HOUSE TALENT
WCJC hosts book signing for authors Spellman and Hudgins
By Zina L. Carter
WHARTON, TEXAS – Wharton County Junior College is hosting a book signing for two of the college’s own authors.
Dr. Paul Spellman, an instructor of history, and WCJC Board of Trustees member Merle Reue Hudgins will be the featured authors at the book signing event, scheduled for 3 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 24, in the Hutchins Memorial Conference Room on the Wharton campus. During the event, both writers will discuss their recent publications and have a number of books available for purchase and for autographs.
A WCJC instructor for 20 years, Spellman is the author of nine books on Texas history and in 2009 was inducted into the Western Writers of America. He is a member of the Texas State Historical Commission, the Texas State Historical Association and the Fort Bend Historic Commission. He holds degrees from Southwestern University, Southern Methodist University, the University of Texas, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi and earned his doctorate from the University of Houston.
Spellman will speak on two of his works: Old 300: Gone to Texas and Until I Come Home: Love Letters from the War, 1918-1919. The first book focuses on the 300 families who followed Stephen F. Austin to Texas in the 1820s while the second book reveals true letters a World War I soldier wrote to his wife back home.
Hudgins is a WCJC alumnus and currently serves on the WCJC Board of Trustees. She is a member of the Texas State Historical Commission, the Texas State Historical Association, and is a charter member of the Wharton County Historical Museum and is the longest serving member of the Wharton County Historical Commission. She is a prolific writer and researcher and is widely known throughout Wharton County for her newspaper column, as a video documentarian and as a historical marker writer for the Texas Historical Commission, works which earned her the moniker “Wharton County’s Official Historian” by the Wharton County Commissioners Court.
At the book signing, Hudgins will present her two-volume work, War Between the States Changed Texas Forever – a Study of Pre-Civil War, Civil War & Post-Civil War. Published earlier this year, the hard cover set – spanning some 850 pages – details America’s most tumultuous period. All proceeds from the sale of the books will benefit the Wharton County Historical Commission.
Wharton County Junior College will host a book signing for Dr. Paul Spellman and Merle Hudgins at 3 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 24, in the Hutchins Memorial Conference Room on the Wharton campus. The public is invited and refreshments will be served.