In exploring the literature of reconciliation, the historian William Tynes Cowa wrote: "The cult of the Lost Cause was part of a larger cultural project: the reconciliation of North and South after the Civil War." He identified a typical image in postwar fiction: a materialistic, rich Yankee man marrying an impoverished spiritual Southern bride as a symbol of happy national reunion. Examining films and visual art, Gallagher identified the theme of "white people North and South extol the "American" virtues both sides manifested during the war, to exalt the restored nation that emerged from the conflict, and to mute the role of African Americans".