Jay Arlon Matthews, Jr.: Soldier, Historian, and Publisher (1918–2004)

Jay Arlon Matthews, Jr., soldier, historian, and publisher, son of Jay A. Matthews, Sr., and Mary Ann (Long) Matthews, was born in St. Louis, Missouri, on April 13, 1918. He grew up in San Jose, California. He attended Fremont High School in Sunnyvale, California, and graduated in 1939. He attended San Jose State College from 1939 to 1941 before joining the U.S. Army. He returned to school later in life and eventually graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in life sciences from St. Edwards University in Austin in 1994.  

During his military service, Matthews initially joined the Combat Engineers of the Seventh Division out of San Francisco and was sent to Camp Swift, Texas. He served in both the European and Pacific theaters and was in the Seventh, Ninety-fifth, and Ninety-seventh Infantry Divisions during World War II. While serving, he met May Clark McLemore at a USO dance hosted by the Driskill Hotel in Austin, Texas. They married on January 16, 1944. Matthews was discharged as a warrant officer in January 1946. He joined the Texas National Guard later that same year. The couple built a house in Austin in 1949 and resided there until their deaths. They had three children.

Matthews was commissioned as an officer in the Texas National Guard. In the early 1950s he also chaired the National Security Committee of the U. S. Junior Chamber of Commerce and became director of civil defense for the city of Austin. He served many roles during his years in the military, including commander of the State Headquarters Detachment (1951–61). In 1957 he assisted in organizing the State Officer Candidate School and served as school administrative officer until 1961. In 1964 Adjutant General Thomas Bishop tasked (then) Colonel Matthews with designing the Texas Legislative Medal of Honor; his design was approved but not awarded until 1997. He also became chief of the Texas Emergency Operations Division (1965–71). He is credited with creating the Military Support to Civil Authorities Branch of the Texas National Guard. Matthews retired as a colonel from military service in 1971. For his dedication and record in the Texas National Guard, he was awarded the Lone Star Distinguished Service Medal and given a brevet promotion to brigadier general in 1973. He was elected to the Texas National Guard’s Hall of Honor in 1990, a program that he created in 1980 to honor exemplary Guardsmen.

After his retirement, he stayed active with the National Guard and served as the historical consultant to the adjutant general from 1973 to 1979. During this time, he researched and reproduced the “Ten Battle Flags of the Texas Revolution” and established the Texas Bicentennial Guard (present-day Guard of the Republic) re-enactment group during the U.S. Bicentennial.

He chaired the Military History Committee of the National Guard Association of Texas for multiple years and founded the Texas Military History journal, where he worked as the editor and publisher for twenty-seven years before stepping down. The journal continued under the name Military History of the West and was published by the University of North Texas Press for many years. In addition to his journal, Matthews was the owner and publisher of the Presidial Press which specialized in Texas, Southwest, and military history. Under his ownership, Presidial published the ten-volume set The Papers of the Texas Revolution, 1835–1836 (1973) which remains the most comprehensive compilation on the Texas Revolution.

Over the course of his life, Matthews was active in the historical community. He was a fellow in the Company of Military Historians, honorary life member of the Instituto Historia de Militar de Mexico, and official historian for the Sixty-fifth Texas Legislature. He was an Episcopalian. Jay Arlon Matthews, Jr., died in Austin on March 4, 2004. He was buried at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery.