Pesos and Dollars: Entrepreneurs in the Texas-Mexico Borderlands, 1880-1940 (Connecting the Greater West Series) - Hardcover

Dewey, Alicia Marion

9781623491758: Pesos and Dollars: Entrepreneurs in the Texas-Mexico Borderlands, 1880-1940 (Connecting the Greater West Series)

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1623491754 ISBN 13: 9781623491758

Publisher: Texas A&M University Press, 2014

The commercial world of South Texas between 1880 and 1940 provided an attractive environment for many seeking to start new businesses, especially businesses that linked the markets and finances of the United States and Mexico. Entrepreneurs regularly crossed the physical border in pursuit of business.

But more important, more complex, and less well-known were the linguistic, cultural, and ethnic borders they navigated daily as they interacted with customers, creditors, business partners, and employees.

Drawing on her expertise as a bankruptcy lawyer, historian Alicia M. Dewey tells the story of how a diverse group of entrepreneurs, including Anglo-Americans, ethnic Mexicans, and European and Middle Eastern immigrants, created and navigated changing business opportunities along the Texas-Mexico border between 1880 and 1940.

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About the Author:

ALICIA M. DEWEY is an associate professor of history at Biola University in La Mirada, California.

Review:

"Concisely written with numerous examples of individual businessmen and women in the South Texas borderlands, Alicia M. Dewey’s book enhances our understanding of the social, economic, and political dynamics that shaped the region’s bi-national history from 1880-1940. Using untapped archival sources, such as business records, bankruptcy court filings, and credit reports, this work describes and analysis the transition from the earlier merchant capitalists to the rise of modern businesses in the region. In doing this, the author clearly shows how men and women of various nationalities and backgrounds obtained credit and the intricacies of how they depended on other merchants and the consumers for their livelihoods. Dewey’s work moves us beyond the tendency to see the Texas-Mexico borderlands as a purely Hispanic-Anglo world and one in which modernization did not arrive until the 1920s or later. It is a solid contribution to Borderlands and Western History. "—Armando Alonzo, Associate Professor, Texas A&M University (Armando Alonzo 2014-06-20)

"At long last, we now have an outstanding new book on a heretofore sadly neglected topic. Alicia Dewey presents readers with an enlightening interdisciplinary study that focuses on the owners of a wide range of business enterprises operating along the Texas-Mexican border in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This outstanding monograph should appeal to scholars interested in several overlapping fields, including borderlands history and business history. Dewey has conducted extensive research in all the pertinent archival resources, and she presents her material in a pleasingly analytical style."—Edwin J. Perkins, Emeritus Professor, University of Southern California (Edwin J. Perkins 2014-06-20)

“Alicia M. Dewey’s masterful business history of South Texas, 1880-1940, combines the meticulous legal analysis of credit markets, bankruptcy proceedings, and entrepreneurial opportunities with the social history of immigrants creating multiethnic business communities. This book demonstrates the lawmindedness of men and women seeking profit in a capitalistic market and restoration through bankruptcy. Dewey challenges many of the assumptions of borderlands historians and constructs a narrative of immigrants building up the country.”— Gordon Morris Bakken, California State University, Fullerton. Author of The Mining Law of 1872: Past, Politics, and Prospects (2008) and editor, Invitation to an Execution: A History of the Death Penalty in the United States (2010) (Gordon Bakken 2014-07-03)

“An impressive work of seminal scholarship, Pesos and Dollars: Entrepreneurs in the Texas-Mexico Borderlands, 1880-1940 is the latest addition to outstanding Texas A&M University Press series Connecting the Greater West. Exceptionally informative and well written.”—The Midwest Book Review, February 2015 (The Midwest Book Review 2015-02-01)

" . . . a bold and meticulously researched book that provides essential nuance to both the study of the South Texas borderlands and the economic history of the state more generally." —Southwestern Historical Quarterly (Southwester Historical Quarterly)

"Alicia M. Dewey's carefully constructed and well-written examination of entrepreneurs in the Texas-Mexico borderlands between 1880 and 1940 offers a new perspective on work and life in a diverse society that resonates in America today. ...is both a social history and a business history of a significant borderlands economy. ...studies such as this one remind us that the past is not always so much different from the present."—Western Historical Quarterly (Christopher J. Castaneda Western Historical Quarterly 2015-08-03)

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