LSU historian to speak on Jeff Davis

Jefferson Davis buff Dr. William J. Cooper is scheduled to speak Saturday at the Young-Sanders Center in Franklin.

The lecture will be held at J.Y. Sanders Hall, 701 Teche Drive, one block from the St. Mary Parish Courthouse.

The Louisiana State University history professor is considered the leading authority on Davis by many of the nation’s top historians. His book, “Jefferson Davis, American,” has been described as a “must read” for students wishing to understand the man who was president of the Confederate States of America. The Houston Chronicle said of the book, “Poignant. … In telling the story of this complex man, Cooper skillfully weaves together details of Davis.”

A graduate of Princeton and John Hopkins universities, Cooper hails from Kingstree, S.C. He is a Fellow recipient of the Guggenheim Fellow, Society of American Historians, National Endowment for the Humanities, Charles Warren Center for the Studies in American History at Harvard University, as well as winner of a Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Biography, Jefferson Davis Award and the LSU Distinguished Research Master honor.

Cooper has authored several books, among them “The Conservative Regime: South Carolina, 1877-1890, The South and the Politics of Slavery,” “Liberty and Slavery: Southern Politics to 1860,” “The American South: A History” with Thomas T. Terrill, “Jefferson Davis and the Civil War Era” and “Jefferson Davis, American.”

The Young-Sanders Center will have a limited number of copies of Cooper’s books for sale.

For more information on Cooper’s lecture, contact Roland R. Stansbury, director of the Young-Sanders Center for the Study of the War Between the States in Louisiana, at (337) 413-1861 or at ysc1861@aol.com.