Texas History Test Research & Evidence-Based Practice 4 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: The Texas General Land Office archives are a critical research resource primarily because they contain:
- Records of all Texas criminal court proceedings since statehood
- Original land survey field notes, maps, and patent records dating to the Republic era (Correct answer)
- Immigration manifests for German and Czech settlers
- Complete records of Texas congressional debates
Correct answer: Original land survey field notes, maps, and patent records dating to the Republic era
The Texas General Land Office holds original land surveys, field notes, patents, and maps that document the history of land distribution in Texas.
Question 2: When a researcher encounters conflicting accounts of the Battle of the Alamo from Mexican and Texan sources, the most appropriate response is to:
- Accept the account from the winning side as more accurate
- Dismiss all accounts as biased and rely solely on archaeological evidence
- Analyze both accounts as evidence of how each side understood and remembered the event (Correct answer)
- Use only accounts written after 1900 to ensure greater objectivity
Correct answer: Analyze both accounts as evidence of how each side understood and remembered the event
Conflicting accounts reveal different perspectives and memories, both of which are historically significant for understanding how events were experienced and interpreted.
Question 3: Carbon-14 dating of organic materials found at Clovis-era archaeological sites in Texas helps researchers primarily establish:
- The trade relationships between early Texan peoples and Mesoamerican cultures
- The approximate age of artifacts and the timeline of early human presence in Texas (Correct answer)
- The cause of extinction of megafauna in North America
- The political structure of Paleo-Indian societies
Correct answer: The approximate age of artifacts and the timeline of early human presence in Texas
Carbon-14 (radiocarbon) dating provides researchers with approximate ages for organic materials, helping establish when early peoples inhabited Texas.
Question 4: A student researching the lives of enslaved people in antebellum Texas would find which source type most revealing of enslaved people's own experiences?
- Plantation account ledgers kept by slaveholders
- Federal census slave schedules listing names and ages
- Freedmen's Bureau interviews and slave narratives collected by the WPA (Correct answer)
- Texas state legislative records on the slave trade
Correct answer: Freedmen's Bureau interviews and slave narratives collected by the WPA
WPA slave narratives and Freedmen's Bureau records capture the voices and recollections of formerly enslaved individuals, offering firsthand perspective on their experiences.
Question 5: A researcher finds a website claiming to present primary documents about early Texas statehood. Which factor is MOST important for evaluating the site's credibility?
- The visual design and number of images on the site
- The sponsoring institution, sourcing of documents, and whether originals can be verified (Correct answer)
- Whether the site appears in the first page of search engine results
- The number of social media shares the site has received
Correct answer: The sponsoring institution, sourcing of documents, and whether originals can be verified
Credibility of a historical website depends on its institutional affiliation, transparent sourcing, and the ability to verify documents against originals.
Question 6: Footnotes and citations in a historical monograph about Texas serve which primary research function?
- Making the book longer to appear more scholarly
- Allowing readers to verify evidence and trace the author's sources (Correct answer)
- Providing additional stories that did not fit in the main text
- Summarizing the book's main arguments for busy readers
Correct answer: Allowing readers to verify evidence and trace the author's sources
Citations and footnotes allow readers to verify the author's use of evidence and locate the original sources for further investigation.
Question 7: Photographs taken during the 1900 Galveston Hurricane are useful historical evidence primarily because they:
- Provide an unbiased and complete record of the disaster's causes
- Offer visual documentation of destruction that supplements written accounts (Correct answer)
- Are more reliable than any written eyewitness testimony
- Prove the exact death toll from the storm
Correct answer: Offer visual documentation of destruction that supplements written accounts
Historical photographs provide visual documentation that complements written records but must also be analyzed critically for framing, intent, and context.
Texas History Test Research & Evidence-Based Practice 4
The Texas General Land Office archives are a critical research resource primarily because they contain: