Who is Dr. Travis Barlow from Texas and what is their importance? Texas_(novel) English & Literature Dr. Travis Barlow | Texas

Dr. Travis Barlow is a native Texan. He works for a Boulder organization, the Institute for Cultural Studies, even though he is a resident of Texas. He has been on leave from his job working in Geneva and returned to Austin to deliver a series of lectures at the University of Texas. While there, he is called to the governor's office and asked to chair a special task Force on Texas history for the Sesquicentennial. Barlow, who did his undergraduate work at Texas received his doctorate at Cambridge and received a Pulitzer Prize for a book that he wrote. Barlow's forebearers, Moses Barlow, first arrived in Gonzales on February 24, 1836 and volunteered to fight at the Alamo. Barlow is touched at the slide show of the Alamo, where his ancestor died. As chairman of the Task force, Barlow has to deal with the different personalities of the other four people. There is the conservatism and anti-Catholic views of the billionaires, Rusk and Quimper, which he must deal with and try to offset. Barlow grew up in a small town in the Texas panhandle as a Lutheran and is caught in the middle of the anti-Catholic views of Rusk. As a result of the publicity as chairman of the Task Force, Barlow is considered for a position at the Smithsonian. At the end of the study, Barlow resigns his position in Boulder to teach at the University of Texas. Rusk and Quimper endowed a chair of one million dollars for him to teach Texas Studies.