The Role of the Texas AAPT Section in the Formation of the Texas APS Section

Twenty-five years ago, at the Fall Meeting of TSAAPT on the TCU campus, some 20 attendees who were members of both AAPT and APS signed a petition addressed to the Council of the American Physical Society requesting that a Texas Section of APS be created. The leaders of the movement declared their belief that holding joint meetings of the Sections would further the interests of both the physics teaching and research communities in Texas. I will describe the conditions which led up to the petition, the hard work by Leonard M. Diana and others that culminated in approval of the Section by Council, and the early days of the new relationship.