Research Symposium

BIO

Jay C. Santiago is a first-year student at FSU studying Chemistry as a major, looking into a political science minor. He enjoys spending time outside of studying doing intern work or research.

Thomas Brown: Tortured to Tactician

Abstract

The primary focus of this research was to examine the historical figure Thomas Brown of the East Florida Rangers and evaluate the kind of person he was. Primarily, the things that might have motivated him to become the person he was throughout his life. There is a consensus among those who have researched his life that he was mainly motivated by revenge. The direction my research took was to look at potential alternative motivations behind his decisions. To evaluate his rationale and produce these alternatives, I read letters written by Brown himself. These letters then needed to be transcribed and translated to become understandable in modern English. Using these letters to illustrate the thoughts and feelings he might have had, I then proposed some alternative aspects of Browns life that might have contributed just as much to his character as the consensus of revenge had.

Keywords: Florida, Rangers, Character Analysis