Ben Wright is a curator and researcher based at UT Austin’s Briscoe Center for American History. Previously he worked as a journalist and then as a press secretary at the Texas state capitol. He has a M.A. in Modern History from King’s College London and is pursuing his Ph.D. in the history department at University of Texas at Austin. His dissertation research focuses on Texas, World War One and the Spanish Flu. More broadly he is interested in the shifting concepts of defeat, failure and tragedy in American memory. Originally from Leicester, England, he has been in Texas since 2003.