| |
| "Texas
Tales" focuses on little-known aspects of Texas history Cox runs across in his
research and travels across the state. Old-time Texas Rangers used to say some
men just need killing. Some stories just need telling, and that's what Cox likes
to do. |
Columns
Lizzie
Hay and the Demise of the Lone Highwayman
2-9-12
Sometimes, no matter how good the story, a compelling tale gets forgotten.
That’s sure the case with the Texas outlaw known in his day as “the lone highwayman.”
Booker,
Texas 1-26-12
The Lipscomb County town of Booker actually started out
as LaKemp, OK ...The
Belle of Marble Falls and the Bear King 1-19-12
If something’s printed
in a newspaper, it’s got to be true, right? Good. Now consider the amazing story
of Miss Ramie Arland...Savoy
Male and Female College 1-11-12
When graduates of the long-extinct Savoy
Male and Female College gathered for their first reunion in 1938, several of the
men did a little reminescing about the Indians fights they had back in the day...
The
Shooting in Donley County 1-6-12
Finch wrote about his experiences in a
now-scarce, self-published family history, “The Lives and Times of a Family Named
Finch.” In his book, he told of an incident that convinced him Texas remained
the Wild West...
The
New Year’s Shooting 12-28-11
“You boys drink beer?” the old man asked,
his German accent heavy on that last word. “I’m buyin’.”...
What
Became of Felipe Frais? 12-22-11
Working his way up a desolate arroyo
choked with catclaw and mesquite, Border Patrol agent Bill Crowe came to an exposed
red sandstone formation... Steamship
Concho 12-14-11
More than two years before the Titanic sank in the icy
waters of the North Atlantic after hitting an iceberg, the Texas-based steamship
Concho ran into something in the Gulf of Mexico on her way to Galveston...Pinto
Beans 12-7-11
Pinto beans were a staple in 19th century Texas and continue
to be today, but their history goes back even further... Life
in Frontier Texas 11-30-11
Too bad Eleanor Jane Hobbs didn’t put more of
her recollections down on paper, but at least she wrote what she did. The
Old Bugle in Fort Stockton 11-23-11
Someone made a startling find: A battered
but still useable military bugle. The instrument was found stashed beneath the
flooring of the old residence. Adding to the mystery is that it was discovered
in an officer’s residence. Being a bugler was an enlisted man’s job... The
Pitchfork Kid 11-17-11
A cowboy’s cowboy, the Kid sat a horse well and
had the reputation of being the best roper in the Panhandle...Poetic
Justice 11-10-11
A tale of true poetic justice lies in a well-worn but
seldom-opened docket book in the Travis County district clerk’s office. Royalty
for a Day 11-3-11
For a man who had lost an arm to a rifle bullet during
the Mexican Revolution, Alvaro Obregon seems to have been a bit lax with security
matters. That attitude, born either of bravery or naivety, would prove costly,
but it also set the stage for an experience that Ruth Wilkerson Henderson remembered
the rest of her long life. Haunted
House in Mason County 10-26-11
Folks said the old stone house in Mason
County was haunted...Dirigible
Over Texas, U.S.S. Shenandoah 10-20-11
Like a scene from a black-and-white
science fiction movie, Texans stopped in their tracks and poured out of buildings
to look skyward as the huge silver object sailed over head...Widows
by Death 10-13-11
In the summer of 1915, when it cost just two cents to
send a letter anywhere in the United States or its territorities, the following
piece of mail arrived at the offices of the Cattleman Magazine in Fort Worth..."Rangering"
in Hamilton County 10-6-11
The nation was barely a year away from the
beginning of its cataclysmic Civil War, but in the spring of 1860, folks along
Texas’ frontier had a more immediate problem on their minds – incursions by hostile
Indians...Flora’s
Tree 9-29-11
The giant pecan, which still stands outside Helen Bentley’s
house in Fort Davis, grew from a sapling planted in 1873...Drought
and Skeleton 9-22-11
Drought in Fort Clark and Skeleton in Brackettville...America's
Third Largest Fire 9-15-11
John Cross had the day off that afternoon, March
21, 1916. Tall and heavy-set, the 20-year-old straddled his Indian motorcycle
and rode to his girlfriend’s house, about a mile from downtown Paris, a thriving
North Texas city of 12,000-plus. As the couple discussed plans for the evening,
Cross heard the Central Station fire bell...Harvey
Hughes’ Short Literary Career 9-8-11
Like
most elected officials, Brewster County Sheriff E.E. Townsend received a fair
amount of correspondence, from postcards bearing descriptions of wanted felons
to legal papers to magazines, but the package that arrived from San Antonio that
day in March 1923 ranked as the most unusual piece of mail he ever received. The
White Wing Hotel 9-1-11
Born with great expectations in the optimistic
post-World War II days, death came 63 years later amid gangs and drug dealers.
Only this was a brick and mortar Baby Boomer, not a person. Nevertheless, when
the end came, it was not pretty.The
Beer Train 8-25-11
A
wreck blocking the mainline between Austin and San Antonio was bad enough, but
this derailment was even worse. Not only had there been casualties, ... the refrigerated
cars telescoped on each other held a liquid cargo capable of causing problems.
While not explosive or toxic, a trainload of beer could be problematic. Alpine’s
Holland Hotel 8-18-11
Brewster County rancher John Holland built the hotel
in 1912 just across from the town’s railroad depot. Though Alpine had neither
dikes nor tulips, in pondering what to name his new inn, Holland saw Holland Hotel
as imminently suitable. Davy
Crockett's Fiddle 8-11-11
"Nero may have fiddled while Rome burned,
but Davy Crockett surely had no time for one last tune when Mexican soldiers made
their final assault on the Alamo. While Crockett did not survive the battle, his
fiddle apparently did."The
Man under the Black Fedora 8-4-11
"While Willeford had not been the
first person to notice the Dillinger signature on the guest register, he was the
first to try to prove or disprove its authenticity. One motivating factor was
his awareness that there had been talk for years that Dillinger had spent some
time in the Big Bend while on the lam."Memories
of What Might Have Been 7-28-11
After taking one final look at the still
form of his mother, Clifton Maxey Cobb discretely pulled the old letter from his
coat pocket and placed it inside her casket. Later that December day following
the services, funeral home workers covered her grave, the last chapter of a love
story dating back to Reconstruction.The
State Capitol Dome 7-21-11
Land Commissioner W.C. Walsh had been watching
the construction of the new Capitol since the first shovel of dirt was tossed
on Feb. 1, 1882... As the new Capitol slowly took shape, so did Walsh’s layman’s
knowledge of architecture. Now, with construction about to begin on the dome,
Walsh grew increasingly uneasy... Texas
Gold Rush 7-14-11
Only four years after thousands of Forty-niners flocked
to California in search of riches, a wave of Fifty-threers headed for the Hill
Country in a little known and short-lived Texas gold rush. Remembering
J. Evetts Haley 7-7-11
During his long life, J. Evetts Haley held down
some of the best “jobs” a person can have: Collector of historical documents for
a university library, rancher, and writer. Lizzie
Crosson had true grit 6-30-11
Born and raised in New Orleans, she married
George Crosson at Brenham in 1866. The couple moved to San Antonio, but Crosson
spent much of his time as a freighter hauling goods to Santa Fe, and across the
Big Bend to Mexico along the Chihuahua Trail. Crosson made a good living, but
he had to keep his wife and children in San Antonio.Horned
Toads 6-23-11
Wearing a lawman’s badge, Everett Townsend had killed men...Ernst
Tinaja 6-16-11
A geologic feature in Big Bend National Park called Ernst
Tinaja, a deep natural water hole dug out of the bedrock over the millenia by
erosion—a place of beauty tainted by a history of death.The
Wonderful Boy 6-9-11
His father a respected Uvalde County rancher, the
quiet, good-looking Guy O. Fenley seemed like a typical teenager except for one
thing – he could see underground water.J.
Frank Dobie 6-1-11
It’s not mentioned in any of his biographies, but one
of Texas’ best known authors wrote portions of one of his best-known books while
sequestered in a tarpaper-covered shack in the Chisos Basin.Lampasas
County’s Longmeadow Cemetery 5-26-11
Historical marker dedication May 21
"Many
of their forebears are buried in this small rural cemetery, a fenced graveyard
accessible only by an unpaved private road..."Telecommunication
of the not-so-distant past 5-19-11
For those knowing no form of electronic
voice communication other than cell phones or Skype, a brief look at the not-so-distant
past.Star
is Born 5-12-11
Star of Mills CountyCommon
Sense Justice in Marlin 5-5-11
A Tammany Hall politician of the old school,
“Battery Dan” Finn presided over one of Manhattan’s police courts in the first
decade of the 20th century -- revered by most, respected even by those he fined
or jailed. Carnie
Philosophy 4-28-11
Edgar Stephens and Robert “Sunshine” Stubblefield spent
most of their lives on the road traveling from town to town in Texas with the
Bill Hames carnival. Sleeper's
Song 4-21-11
As a long-time Texas lawyer, Ben Sleeper wrote many a legalese-laden
petition alledging this or that in behalf of his clients, but few if any of them
ever knew of – much less heard – the patriotic song he composed as a young Army
officer in training back during World War I. Rawhides:
Business in Wild and Woolly Tee Pee City 4-14-11
A buffalo wasn’t the only
critter that could get skinned on the High Plains if he wasn’t careful.
Lubbock
Ghost Stories 4-7-11
Two Lubbock ghost stories and one strange tale of
a man who made his amends for a ghastly crime one brick at a time.The
Boy With Two Tombstones
Or Iraan's “Little Boy Lost.” 3-30-11
"Ellis…Son
of [missing] Born March 3, 1870 – Died Nov. 28, 1872." Not only was it odd
to discover a tombstone in a flower bed, the dates it bore presented a mystery
on top of a mystery... The
Chilled Catfish of Concho County 3-24-11
Running for his life, Cline made
it over the bridge in time to beat the roiling flood surge heading in his direction.
As Cline watched in horror, a watery cliff crashed into a wagon, sending it and
its occupants tumbling downstream. That was shocking, but what Cline saw next
was simply bizarre. No matter the tragedy that has just unfolded, men soon began
gathering along the river and pulling big fish from the water...Palo
Duro Gold Rush 3-18-11
Once upon a time, a shower of shiny gold coins fell
from the sky over Palo Duro Canyon State Park south of Amarillo... Fishing
in Port Aransas 3-10-11
Hard to believe, but Texans haven’t always fished
just for fun. Along the coast, from the time of the fierce Karankawas until the
latter days of the 19th century, fishing was about eating, not a recreational
pursuit. Pronghorn
Antelope 3-3-11
No thanks to Lester B. Colby and anyone else who may have
done what he did, thousands of pronghorn antelope are still home on the range
in the Panhandle. Old
Trail Drivers 2-24-11
No matter the old cowpoke’s backstory, in his dotage
he could round up words on paper just about as well as he once rode down and roped
strays.A
Story of Two Veterans: They Didn't Take the War Personally 2-17-11
Nacogdoches’
Oak Grove Cemetery is one of the oldest and most historical graveyards in Texas,
but one of its better stories has hardly been told. Davy
Crockett Won 2-10-11
“Davy Crockett Won,” reads the small-type headline
on a back page of the Jan. 4, 1893 Austin Daily Statesman.Wild
Bill the Driller 2-3-11
Not everyone immediately struck it rich during
the West Texas oil booms of the first couple of decades of the 20th century. Aptly
named cable too driller Wiliam Wells left his wife and kids in Oklahoma and headed
for the Lone Star State...The
Sword in the Tree 1-27-11
The story Todd heard as a kid is classic folklore:
A Spanish mule train laden with gold coins from Mexico is shadowed by Indians.
Desperate to lighten their load and escape attack, the teamsters bury all the
gold on the bank of a stream that would come to be called Walnut Creek.Comanche
Raids in Coryell County 1-27-11
The Comanches felt free to raid all along
the state’s western frontier. Texas’ Confederate state government fielded companies
of Rangers to patrol the outlying counties, but they couldn’t be everywhere at
once. That’s how things stood on April 26, 1863 when a Comanche raiding party...Old
Rangers and Sam Houston's Grave 1-13-11
The old Texas Rangers who gathered
in Austin for a reunion in the early fall of 1897 surely figured they had fought
their last fight. After all, they had battled and survived Mexican soldiers, Comanches
and outlaws. But that’s before they heard what some folks in Tennessee were up
to...A
Piece of Texas’ Past 1-6-11
If you’re interested in history, and like getting
out and about, you’ve probably stooped to pick up a piece of Texas’ past at some
point in your life. Fort
Kirby 12-30-10
In the spring of 1946, an Army major assigned to desk duty
at the Pentagon had his sergeant call the War Records Office at the National Archives
to ask if they had any information on an old military post in South Texas called
Fort Kirby...Christmas
Dinner 12-23-10
In the letter the Galveston News published on Dec. 21,
1893, the former ranger A. J. Sowell expanded on an incident he had only mentioned
briefly in his 1884 book “Rangers and Pioneers of Texas.” Prairie
Fire 12-16-10
The Rev. C.B. Jernigan spent most of his life trying to save
sinners from eternal fire and brimstone, but when he finally got around to writing
a memoir he devoted a full chapter to an incident from childhood he remembered
as hell on earth – a raging winter prairie fire. Sundial
in San Ygnacio 12-9-10
The weathered sundial positioned on top of the arched
entrance to the old family fort at San Ygnacio tells more than the time – it tells
a story. Brownfield's
Riot That Never Was 12-1-10
In the summer of 1908 an article with a Fort
Worth dateline published in a Sunday edition of the New York Herald caught the
eye of President Theodore Roosevelt...Pecans
11-25-10
There’s more to the nut produced by Texas’ official state tree than
food value. At least there used to be. Early-day Texas kids, not having a very
wide variety of what used to be called “store bought” toys, found ways to play
with pecans before eating them. Yankee
Sawfish 11-18-10
Now extremely rare, sawfish are curious marine creatures
that use their unusual bladed snout to find food and then make it bite sized.
But even stranger is how one Texas sawfish indirectly aided the Union Army during
the Civil War.Texas
Thanksgiving 11-11-10
Like a flock of wild turkeys pecking around in search
of food, the date that Texans set aside to celebrate their blessings kept jumping
around the calendar until well into the 20th century. The
Great Chicken-Fried Steak Hoax 10-28-10
Ever wonder how a legend gets started?
I had a small role in the creation of what has become one of Texas’ most enduring
pieces of “fakelore” -- the story of the invention of the chicken-fried steak.
Hughes
Springs and Trammell’s Treasure 10-20-10
More than 300 miles inland from
the Gulf of Mexico, the community of Hughes Springs owes its existence to a fanciful
pirate story and one man who believed it. The
Haunting of the Old Travis County Jail 10-14-10
Harvey, 34, had the distinction
of being the last of nine men legally hanged in the castle-like stone jail, built
for $100,000 in 1876 at the corner of 11th and Brazos streets — present location
of the Dewitt C. Greer Building, headquarters of what is now the Texas Department
of Transportation. A
Lion and a Boy 10-7-10
And oilman Charles Edward Hipp of GrahamFaded
Photographs 9-30-10
"The people in these images could be your ancestors.
Or mine. One thing is sure: They are long dead, and so, too, is anyone who could
identify them." Texas
Expressions 9-23-10
For years, I have collected Texas expressions like
some people do postage stamps. Herewith, in no particular order, a sampling.Austin
as Texas’ Capital 9-16-10
All elections are important in a democracy, but
early-day Austinites went through two elections that could have turned their city
into a ghost town. At stake was whether Austin would remain Texas’ capital. The
Hat Story 9-9-10
When Mrs. Jane Greenwood set out to write her autobiography
in 1965, she knew she had to tell the hat story. What
happened to Charles Francis Coghlan 9-2-10
His story is either one of the
most incredible tales ever told, pure legend or a mixture of fact and fiction.Archeological
Diversion Ensured Granddad a Quiet Hunt 8-26-10A
Hanging in Austin 8-19--10
Forty years ago, the late Edmunds Travis of
Austin told me about a hanging he reluctantly covered for the Austin daily he
edited in 1913... Sea
Monster of Port Isabel 8-12-10
The monster showed up in the Gulf of Mexico
off the small fishing village of Port Isabel in the summer of 1938. That Aug.
10, in a short article buried on a back page, the Brownsville Herald devoted five
paragraphs to “the sea monster that is attracting so much attention in the waters
of the Gulf of Mexico.”...A
little Texas cultural history 8-5-10
Surely most parents go through times
when they wonder if they have failed at our species’ most important job: Child-rearing...Houston
7-29-10
An Internet search reveals five U.S. communities named Houston along
with three counties named Houston, including one in Texas... El
Paso and the Battle of Juarez 7-22-10
On June 29, during a gun battle in
Juarez, Mexico, seven stray AK 47 rifle rounds flew across the Rio Grande and
hit city hall in downtown El Paso... Nearly a hundred years have gone by since
the last time it happened... Mertzon
Windmills 7-15-10
Last time I drove through Mertzon, it sunk in on me that
the windmills were gone...The
Secret Hurricane 7-8-10
Don’t tell anybody, but there’s a hurricane in
the Gulf ...Cut
and Shoot, Gun Barrel City, Gunsight, Point Blank and Winchester 6-30-10Death
Notice 6-23-10
Anyone who has ever worked on the editorial side of a newspaper,
which given all the various career paths out there is not a huge percentage of
the labor force, knows about writing obituaries... Johnson
Island 6-17-10
The graveyard, accessible today only by boat or toll bridge,
is all that’s left of the Johnson Island Military Prison, a Lake Erie facility
that held an average of 2,500 Confederate prisoners – all of them officers – throughout
the Civil War... Pica
Pole 6-10-10
Now a relic of the vanished hot type era, a pica pole used
to be as integral to the newspaper business as servers are to Web sites. So what’s
a pica pole?Kate
Polly's Pancakes 6-3-10
Next time you fry a stack of pancakes, imagine
what it would be like if your life and the well-being of your children depended
on it.Willie
Morris 5-27-10Thurber
Brick 5-20-10Fritch
5-13-10
Starting in the mid-1930s and continuing well into the ‘50s, Fritch
must have had some of the most mannerly, patient postal patrons in the country...Jokes
5-6-10
Folks who are really good at conveying ideas and information often do
so through story-telling. And if those stories are funny, it’s all the better.
Cisco
Twister 4-29-10
In Cisco’s Oakwood Cemetery, five graves bear the same
last name and the same date of death – April 28, 1893. That was the day a killer
tornado struck...Motels
4-22-10
I passed through Clarendon... That’s where I saw a local overnight
place called the It’ll Do Motel. Flagpole
4-15-10
This story is about a mystery involving the flag staff that once stood
at Camp Howze, a sprawling World War II Army base at Gainesville...1837
4-8-10 Fishing
Hogg 4-1-10
In the spring, many a young man’s fancy turns to…fishing.
Back in the spring of 1891, even Gov. James S. Hogg could not control an urge..Barnhart
3-24-10
Dust, bawling cattle, hell-raising cowboys and trains a half-mile long
– that was Barnhart in the 1920s and ‘30s... First
Capitol 3-18-10
To all but his political enemies, the government of Mexico
and a few soreheads, the 44-year-old Tennessee transplant stood tall both literally
and figuratively as Texas’ greatest living hero...Moonlight
Reflections at the Alamo 3-11-10Buck's
Horse 3-4-10
Nothing’s perfect, but occasionally a good writer manages
to arrange the literary building blocks we call words, sentences and paragraphs
in such a way as to surprise and please the reader... Post
Offices 2-25-10
With email and other forms of digital communication virtually
(pun intended) having killed old-fashioned first class mail, it’s time to pay
more attention to the history of all the hundreds if not thousands of post offices
Texas has had over the years. Many have been closed...Hazlewood
Fight 2-18-10
“The Indians, as a mark of recognition to bravery, would
leave an arrow sticking upright in the ground by an victim whose valor and fighting
spirit they respected... When Hazlewood’s body was found, so goes the story, an
arrow so upright bore evidence…to his courage.” Wolf
Girl 2-5-10
When the boy returned home that day he told his parents a
story as horrifying as it was unbelievable. Big
Lake News 1-28-10Jackson
Day 1-21-10Texas’
10 Worst Disasters 1-14-10Lone
Wolf 1-7-10
Long-time Ranger Captain Manual T. Gonzaullas, one of Texas’
best-known 20th century law enforcement officers is once again at the center of
a mystery...Thirsty
12-30-09
Along the Texas frontier, bad water posed just about as much of a
problem as no or little water.
Hog
Stories 12-24-09Christmas
Shooting 12-17-09
Many Texas families have their particular Christmas traditions,
but the way the Hornsby clan used to observe the holiday may just take the fruitcake...
Wainwright's
Buck 12-10-09
Anyone who knows anything about the history of World War
Two has heard of Gen. Jonathan M. Wainwright. Far less known, however, is the
story of the last skirmish in which he was ranking officer, a brief engagement
that occurred on a West Texas ranch in the late 1940s... Marshal
Pitman 12-3-09
Walter W. Pitman’s good luck held for more than half a century.
Not everything went his way, but in big-stake deals the figurative roulette wheel
of life generally spun in his favor... Turkey
Hunt 11-26-09
When the governor and the state’s highest ranking U.S. Army
officer took time off from their official duties to go turkey hunting together
in the late winter of 1890, the outing did not escape the attention of the state’s
leading newspaper...Population
Ranks 11-19-09
For historians, genealogists, and anyone interested in
a little Texas trivia, I’ve compiled the historic urban population hierarchy and
population figures dating back to 1850. The 1850 and 1860 listings contain the
top 10 cities, since there are some surprises...Fishing
Soldier 11-12-09
When a wagon full of soldiers rolled out of old Fort
Belknap early one spring morning in 1867 flanked by horseback troopers, while
doubtless armed, they were not starting out on a scout for Indians. John
Roan Mystery 11-4-09
On Dec. 13, 1879, the Atlanta Constitution published
a brief story that should have been big news in Texas, but somehow no editor in
the Lone Star state picked up on the Georgia daily’s report. The story dealt with
the purported solution of a 29-year-old mystery in Central Texas, the disappearance
of one John Roan...Preacher
Freeman 10-29-09
Religious beliefs aside, all of us owe a debt to the
early-day Baptist and Methodist preachers. They not only saved souls, being literate
in an era when many were not, they saved a lot of history in their written recollections...
Mobeetie
Preachers 10-22-09Old
Jokes 10-14-09
Ever wonder what jokes made your great-grandparents laugh?...Hughes'
Stock Book 10-8-09
Labeled “Horse Record – Hughes Bros.” the book contains
hand written records of horses sold and tradedThe
Huntsville Humdinger and the Texas Prison Rodeo 10-1-09
When the Huntsville
Humdinger hit the streets that Monday, the feisty four-column competitor of the
long-established Huntsville Item carried on page one a humdinger of a local scoop:
The prison system would be starting a rodeo that fall. On Sept. 4, 1931...Tesnus,
Texas 9-24-09
Tesnus, Texas is one of those ethereal ghost towns—except
for a railroad siding and a sign, no physical evidence of it remains... Judge
Stories 9-17-09
The Texans we elect to the bench often figure in amusing
stories. Especially long-time judges like the late Mace B. Thurman Jr...Baled
in a Bale 9-11-09
Though most of the ginning is done by brainless machinery,
the industry’s human element has developed a colorful folklore with a range of
subsets.Central
Texas Flood 9-3-09
The first day it started raining, people took it as
good news...
Port
Isabel Wireless 8-27-09
In 1915 the U.S. military had plans to install
at Point Isabel a state-of-the-art radio facility that would provide virtually
instantaneous communication as the government prepared for the possibility of
a second war with Mexico. Ice
Man 8-22-09
With grim determination, a normally peaceful, law-abiding man
who’s just learned he’s been done wrong starts to strap on his six-shooter aiming
to make things right... The
Texas Ranger 8-13-09
I wrote about this ship with a famous name last summer,
but only recently ran into some additional information on her... U.S.
67 8-6-09
It may not be the Mother Road, but U.S. 67 stretches 1,560 miles
across five states, connecting Iowa to Mexico. The highway extends through Texas,
Arkansas, Missouri, and Illinois to the intersection of U.S. 52 in Sabula, Iowa,
population 670. Six hundred thirty-seven miles of U.S. 67 are in Texas, from Presidio
to Texarkana...Bluffton
Reappears 7-30-09
At this writing, the normally sprawling Lake Buchanan
is only 51 per cent full... While a few traces of the old town have become visible,
most of it is still under water...Bonnie
and Clyde Slept Here 7-23-09Heat
7-16-09Runaway
scrapes 7-9-09July
4, 1894 7-2-09The
Old Book Shelf 6-24-09Ranger
Silver 6-18-09Susan's
Indians 6-11-09Ghost
Ships 6-4-09Sideshow
Texans 5-28-09
News
Bits 5-21-09Joe
Pruno 5-14-09Book
Snippets 5-7-09Pecos
High Bridge 4-30-09
The “fair young” Pecos River QueenFlash
II 4-23-09
More news about the Flash, the vessel that carried the Twin
Sisters most of the way to the Texian army just in time for Sam Houston’s decisive
defeat of Santa Anna at San Jacinto...Flash
4-15-09
Some aspects of Texas’ struggle for independence from Mexico have
fallen through the figurative cracks in the floor of history’s log cabin. The
Flash is a good example... Early
Movie Making 4-11-09Quito
4-2-09
The ghostliest of ghost towns are those that existed only on paper...Texas
Sketchbook 3-26-09
Humble, a Texas oil company created in 1911... published
thousands of copies of the “Texas Sketchbook”... Boyce
House 3-19-09
Boyce House deserves to be remembered...Elmo
Johnson 3-12-09
This is not the first time the border has been a dangerous
place.Gail
Borden 3-5-09
A New Yorker who grew up in Indiana, Gail Borden came to
Texas in 1829, five years after his brother Thomas arrived as one of Stephen F.
Austin’s colonists...Pansy
2-26-09
The old woman walked along one of McCamey’s unpaved streets, pulling
a red Radio Flyer wagon...Indian
Stories 2-19-09
Texas fought two wars during the Civil War. One war, of
course, was the bloody struggle against the North... The second war was primarily
one of self-defense against hostile Indian tribes taking advantage of the absence
of the U.S. military and the state’s preoccupation with the larger war...The
Hermit in the Dugout 2-11-09
Why would anyone want to live out their years
in a dirt-floor dugout competing for shade with scorpions and rattlesnakes in
the summer and warmed only by burning chopped railroad ties in the winter? Gold.Clyde’s
Funeral 2-5-09
Stories can turn up in weird places. For instance, who would
expect to find an account of the Depression-era outlaw Clyde Barrow’s funeral
in the self-published memoir of a long-time fiddler-turned-preacher?Treasury
Raid 1-29-09
When the bell atop the First Baptist Church started clanging
about 9 o’clock that Sunday night, it was not a call to worship. It was June 11,
1865. A full moon hung over Austin, a city of some 4,000 residents. Hog
Killing Time 1-22-09
"You don’t have to delve too deeply into almost
any written recollection of a Texan who lived in the days before refrigeration
became the norm to find accounts of hog-killing."Owen
Wister 1-15-09
The cultured gentleman from Philadelphia generally credited
with inventing the Western novel, a genre that evolved into film and eventually
television, spent some time in West Texas on his way to becoming a nationally-known
writer...Bluebonnet
Hotel 1-8-09
Now surrounded by so many 200-foot tall wind turbines that
it has become the wind power capital of the nation, Sweetwater used to have a
more traditional skyscraper – the seven-story Bluebonnet Hotel...Pranks
12-31-08
Whatever happened to pranks? Old-time Texans enjoyed practical jokes
more than their descendants seem to. A sampling of long-ago stunts:...Belle
Christmas 12-22-08
No matter how she came to be called Belle Christmas,
she had a reputation as a local character long before someone dreamed up the “Keep
Austin Weird” bumper sticker... Old
But Odd Gift Ideas 12-18-08
The December 1911 issue of a long-forgotten
but fun-to-read iconoclastic monthly called K. Lamity’s Harpoon offered a full-page
ad from a Uvalde taxidermist with some unusual gift items for sale that some modern
readers will probably wish were still available today...Captain
Billy’s Whiz Bang 12-11-08
Oil field shacks, military barracks, college
rooming houses, hotels catering to traveling salesmen, smoke-filled railroad cars
or the outhouse – anywhere in Texas young men could be found, so could a copy
of Captain Billy’s Whiz Bang...Bad
Man Returns 12-4-08
As the old saying goes, it’s hard to keep a good man
down. But that sure couldn’t account for Bill Johnson’s reappearance in McLennan
County. One of Texas’ lesser-known outlaws...Bill
Wharton 11-27-08
Used to be, especially in the 18th and 19th centuries,
some people were born Thankful and died Thankful. That’s because, way back, parents
sometimes named their daughters Thankful. Born in 1803, Thankful Rankin...Boo-boo
towns 11-27-08
Call ‘em boo-boo towns. The Texas map is sprinkled with
cities and towns that got their names by mistake...White
Buffalo 11-18-08
The rifle roared, a .50 caliber hunk of lead smacked into
the side of the buffalo and the huge animal tumbled to the ground. That happened
all across the plains of Texas during the 1870s, but this was no ordinary bison
– it was all white, one of only seven known to have been killed on the North American
continent... Remembering
Austin 11-6-08
On July 2, 1864, Congress passed an act to turn the original
House chamber into a hall of statuary…Ranger
Cemeteries 10-30-08
Except for the occasional thunder-like sound of a
jet taking off or landing at Austin’s Bergstrom International Airport, the small
cemetery could be out in the middle of nowhere...Art
10-23-08
Until shortly after World War One, Art’s name was Plehweville, a
handle that sounds something like a sneeze, followed by “ville.”... Horse
Troughs 10-16-08
Water troughs, better known in Texas as horse troughs,
were intended for the hydration of livestock. But Texas ranchers and their families
found far more use for these open containers of water than merely affording Old
Dobbin a place to drink...Fall
Roundup 10-9-08
In his 1937 book, “Memories,” J.B. Cranfill told the story
of J. M. Carroll, a man who had the reputation of being the best wing shot in
Texas... Indian
Emily 10-2-08October
Barrel 9-25-08Balinese
Room Cashiered 9-18-08Rankin
Beach 9-11-08Ghost
in No. 7 9-4-08
The old officer’s quarters at Fort Concho... Hardin's
Shotgun 8-27-08
John Wesley Hardin's shotgun used by him to kill the Sheriff
of DeWitt County, the most notorious of the men...Peaches
8-21-08
Most peach trees seldom make it past their first decade of existence.
That’s what made the peach tree outside the old stone structure in Burnet at the
site of Fort Croghan so unusual... Million
Barrel Hole 8-14-08Trivia
8-7-08Possum
Trot 7-30-08Steamship
Texas Ranger 7-24-08Old
Pecos 7-17-08Cuttings
7-10-08Terry's
Texas Rangers 7-3-08 Twin
Towns 6-26-08Forgotten
Conservationist 6-19-08Austin
Fires 6-12-08Battle
of Medina 6-5-08Bud
Newman, part II 5-29-08Bud
Newman Gang 5-26-08Badger
Fight 5-26-08Ben's
Pistol 5-8-08Indianola
Remnants 5-1-08San
Jacinto Hero Henry Millard 4-17-08Earth
4-10-08Henigan
Water 4-3-08Sam
Houston 3-27-08Bull
in the Brush 3-20-08Denison
UFO 3-13-08Alamo
Backdoor 3-6-08Coffee
Drinkers 2-28-08International
Pavedway 2-21-08Valentine’s
Day 2-14-08Rock
Fences 2-7-08Granite
1-31-08Buffalo
Bill 1-24-08Shumla
1-18-08Travel
Trailers 1-9-08Suddenly
Silly 1-3-08Buggies
12-26-07Oil
Patch Memories 12-22-07More
News of the Odd 12-13-07Santa
Robber 12-6-07Staple
Shopping 11-29-07Bosque
Treasure 11-20-07Biscuits
11-17-07Doe
and a Bride 11-8-07Tramp
Printers 11-1-07Chupacabra
10-24-07
Does a zoologically unknown, blood-sucking creature prowl the South
Texas mesquite?... FDR
10-18-07Valley
Talk 10-12-07Sullivan
10-4-07Cow
Patties 9-26-07Pope's
Flying Machine 9-19-07Camels
9-12-07Carr
Boys 9-6-07The
Banker 8-30-07Austin
Happenings 8-22-07Pan-Am
and the Valley 8-17-07Gator
8-14-07Transitions
8-3-07Robert
Leroy Ripley 7-31-07In
the News 7-17-07CSA
Veterans 7-12-07Chinese
Coins 7-5-07Big
Map 6-27-07Menard
Grave 6-20-07Prairie
Fires 6-14-07Armless
Judge 6-7-07Dumont
5-30-07Centennial
House 5-23-07Kinch
West 5-16-07Checkers
5-9-07Road
Log 1922 5-3-07Weird
News 4-26-07
From the Lone Star State in 1899Hail
Storm 4-19-07
Just a boy at the time, Howard Campbell never lost his vivid
memory of the only time he ever saw both of his parents cry... Capitol
No. 1 4-12-07
The story of a civil engineer from San Antonio who earned
less than the value of a good mule for designing a new capitol for Texas...
John
Ringo 4-5-07
"It didn't play out quite like a scene from "Gunsmoke,"
but two of the Old West's more notorious characters faced each other in Austin's
red light district in 1881..."Sam's
Mother-in-Law 3-30-07
"Despite the rocky beginning of their relationship,
Sam Houston treated Mrs. Nancy Lea, his mother-in-law, with all due respect..."Lindbergh
3-27-07Bagdad
4-3-07
"Far from the Middle East, another Bagdad lay on the south side
of the Rio Grande at the river's mouth, just across from a Texas town called Clarksville.
(Not to be confused with the Clarksville in Red River County.)"
Richard
Ellis 4-3-07Stage
Coach 4-3-07Reconstruction
Valentine 2-16-07Tallest
Rebel 2-8-07
Henry Clay ThrustonPhotographer
Louis de Planque 2-1-07Priddy
Good Sandwiches 1-26-07Baskin-McGregor
Act 1-23-07Cotton
Picking 1-11-071907
1-4-07New
Year's Day 12-28-06Early
Hunting 12-21-06Burnt
Boot Creek 12-14-06Blue
Northers 12-7-06Moctezuma
11-28-06Lord's
Acre 11-23-06La
Posada 11-16-06
Laredo's La Posada Hotel
Rockport
Ships 11-9-06Mystery
Wall 11-2-06
Someone went to a lot of trouble to build the old stacked-stone
wall hidden in a thick stand of yaupon and other brush on a Lee County ranch...Dead
Man's Hole 10-30-06Bowie
10-19-06 Extra
Slow 10-12-06
"Early day Austin newspaper editor Edmunds Travis liked
to claim he had a hand in putting out both the slowest and fastest extras in Texas
newspaper history."
Rankin
Hotel 10-5-06Withers
9-28-06Rural
Mail Routes 9-21-06Moody
House 9-14-06
The two-story Victorian house in Taylor has been nicely
restored...Thurber
Booze 9-7-06Mother
8-30-06Disappearing
Cows 8-24-06
"... Not only did the animals move, many believed that
unrested souls flitted about. Strange things were said to happen..."Texas
City 1914 8-17-06
"A small town with a big name, Texas City hosted
an Army camp..."
Kid
Murray 8-10-06
Texas' least-known outlaw, newspapers dubbed him "Kid"
Murray... Humble
Fire 8-2-06
"...Hudson's enthusiasm for the oil business changed
abruptly on July 23, 1905. That evening, a thunderstorm triggered a bolt of lightning
that ignited the oil in one of the large tanks Hudson had helped build.Old
Sam Houston Song 7-27-06
"The song, reprinted in 1928 in a long-defunct
Texas magazine called Bunker's Monthly, lies on the pages of the few surviving
copies of that publication, long forgotten..."
Clairmont
Jail 7-20-06Antlers
7-13-06Down
in Texas 7-6-06
"'Down in Texas' captured what the rest of the nation
wanted to believe about the Lone Star State's petroleum boom towns..."
Rochester
Teacher 6-29-06
School teaching has never been the best paying avocation,
but the terms of employment have definitely improved over the last century...
Lehmann
Show 6-22-06
When Fred Gipson's family went to an old-settlers reunion
and fair at Katemcy to see the aging Herman Lehmann put on a one-man exhibition,
the Mason County youngster got a taste of the old west far more realistic than
anything he ever saw in a Tom Mix movie...Llano
Gold 6-15-06
Washed in golden sunset, from a distance Llano County's Sharp
Mountain looks like a giant Paleolithic flint hide scraper lying on its side...
Few today know about the long-abandoned mine shafts the mountain hides...Austin
Will 6-8-06
Austin real estate agent Susanne Lee has fond memories of
the house in Houston she grew up in, but until recently she never knew it had
much of a history. Sheriff
Kirk 6-1-06
"...The killing of Sheriff Kirk stands out as an Old
West shootout worthy of any Hollywood Western..." Lolita
5-18-06Eureka
5-12-06
"...Ozona did become the county seat. Today, Eureka-first known
as Couch Well - is not even a ghost town, only a ghost name..."Karma
5-5-06Plains
Pioneer Charlie Saigling 4-27-06Prairiedom
4-21-05
Most people driving along U.S. 71 from Austin to Columbus don't spend
any time thinking about the highway bridges that afford them the ability to cross
streams and rivers without getting wet. Wild
Navidad 4-14-06
The Navidad River is only 74 miles long but it is as tangled
in history and folklore as the vines and trees along its banks...Baker
Talk4-11-06
The talk Captain Mosley Baker supposedly gave to the men of
his company at San Jacinto on April 21, 1836...Bluebonnets
3-30-06Wired
3-24-06Barton
Springs 3-17-06Houston
Ring 3-9-06Adobe
Outposts on the Rio Grande 3-1-06Line
in the Sand 2-23-06Army
Booze 2-16-06Earl
Abel's 2-13-061918
Flu 2-2-06Cleo
Face 1-26-06
"The folks along Bear Creek in Kimble County always
called the mysterious stone carving the “Cleo Face.”
Gulf
U-boats 1-20-06Columbus
Tower 1-13-06
"No matter how European it looks, however, the tower
is the product of Yankee – well, Southern – ingenuity."
Cowboy
Tree 12-22-05Hudson
Bend 12-16-05
"Maybe some day a scuba diver will find the old bent
rifle barrel at the bottom of Lake Travis..."
Medley
12-10-05
Sam Houston and more
Bull
Creek Battle 12-3-05
"Now covered with spacious, expensive houses,
the cedar-studded canyons on the western edge of Austin used to be Central Texas’
version of Appalachia."
Crockett
News 11-17-05
"Volume one, number one of the newspaper appeared to
enlighten the citizenry of Houston County on Dec. 6, 1853. It had not been an
easy process."Last
Cavalry Horse 11-17-05
"That cold winter morning, Dec.14, 1932, was
a sad one for old-time horse soldiers and civilians alike at Fort D.A. Russell
in Marfa -- they both realized they were witnessing the end of an era."
Amarillo
Symphony 11-3-05
"The whistle was music to the railroad man’s ears.
With tongue-in-cheek, he called it the “Amarillo Symphony.”
Storm
of 1895 10-26-05
The dust storm in El Paso
Jackass
in Heaven 10-20-05
"Clay McGonagill may have been the ropingest
cowboy Texas ever produced..."
Dead
Ellis 10-13-05Catarina
10-6-05
If you’re looking for a ghost, it figures you’d go to a ghost town
to find one.Circus
9-29-05
The Gainesville Community Circus in the 1950s
Outlaw
Letter 9-20-05
An outlaw's love letter in 1878
Missing
Coat 9-15-05
"Third-term Sterling County Sheriff S.T. Wood..."Galveston
1900 9-8-05Lady
Doc 9-1-05
Dr. Sofie Herzog, first female surgeon in Texas
Exterminator
8-23-05
German immigrant J.C. Melcher of Fayette County and Port Lavaca
Nameless
Cave 8-18-05
Nameless, Texas, Nameless Cave and hermit's treasure.
Bombsite
8-10-05
The story of the Manhattan Project and its product, the atomic bombs
against Japan on August 6 and 9, 1945, has been well told. But buried in all the
official documents is another story, far less known.
Oddities
8-1-05
"The December 1938 issue offered some items of Texas trivia just
as interesting today as they were then."
Book
Burning 7-22-05
“Where they have burned books,” German poet Johann Heinrich
Heine wrote in the 19th century, “they will end in burning human beings.” Indeed,
Texans have done both.
Terrell
County 7-14-05
Bexar and Terrell County
Sam
Houston's Will 7-6-05Rev.
Dancer 7-1-05
Namesake of Dancer Peak neat LlanoPoker
6-23-05
"Gambling was a Galveston institution early on."
Dare
Devil Rogers 6-16-05
:During the Depression, as the people of the nation
collectively dug deep into their pockets and often came up with nothing, Dare
Devil dug his own grave time after time, town after town."
Lost
Sword 6-8-05
"Somewhere in Texas is a sword with a history."O.
Henry 6-2-05
"The mustachioed young man from North Carolina hardly
seemed the martial type, but as a citizen soldier in the Austin Grays he demonstrated
the qualities of a leader – even if it was to keep from spending the night in
the guardhouse...."
Stagecoach
Holdup 5-26-05
"Stagecoach robberies happened so often along the
Texas frontier it came to be considered something of a right of passage to hand
over one’s money and valuables to a masked man with a gun on some lonely roadside."Whiskey
Funeral 5-19-05
"He won his nickname when he got so desperate for
a drink that he traded his horse and saddle for a gallon of whiskey."
Bold
CSA Vet Thomas Evans Riddle, & Man o’ War 5-14-05
Thomas Evans Riddle
bet on a dead racehorse. He lost.
Wells
Branch 5-7-05
"Today, as the rustic center piece of Katherine Fleischer
Park, the cabin sits in the middle of some 8,000 residences occupied by 20,000
people."Freer
5-1-05
"In rhyme, Wilson tried to distill life in and around the Duval
County town of Freer, the state’s last truly wild and wooly oil boom town."
Patriots
4-26-05
"The American Revolution lasted seven years, affording plenty
of men the opportunity to go down in history as patriots."
Freeny
Hanging 4-17-05
"James Washington White lost an arm fighting for
the South during the Civil War. He could have spent the rest of his life seething
with bitterness, but that’s not how it turned out."
Twin
Sisters 4-5-05
The most famous pieces of artillery in Texas historySan
Jacinto Monument 3-23-05
"Most people think the towering star-topped
limestone monument, built during the Texas Centennial in 1936, is the only San
Jacinto monument. Actually, it’s only the biggest."Spanish
Cattle 3-21-05
"All those longhorns that revitalized Texas’ post-Civil
War economy had to come from somewhere. And where the breed came from was the
interior of Mexico. Via trail drive."
Jesus
3-21-05
When old “Hay-sus” died that winter afternoon, just about everyone
in Eagle Pass mourned.
Davy's
Widow 3-9-0
Elizabeth Patton CrockettKKK
3-1-05Mission
Rules 2-22-05
Around 1760, a now-unknown Franciscan priest at the Apostolic
College for Missionaries in Queretaro, Mexico set down rules for Texas missionaries.
The rules, laden with advice, were “meant for a missionary who has never been
in charge of a mission and is all alone and does not know whom to consult for
advice.”
Battle
of Brushy Creek 2-05
A little-known fight between Comanche warriors and
Texas Rangers
August
Carl Weiss 2-16-05
During the Civil War not every Southern soldier served
in the Confederate army because he believed in slavery or hated Yankees. Some
shouldered arms only because they had to. That was the case with August Carl Weiss,
one of 2,000 men who soldiered for the South in Waul’s Legion, a unit raised at
Brenham by Thomas Neville Waul.
Chili
by Mike Cox 1-31-05
William Gerald Tobin’s career as a Texas Ranger left a
lot to be desired. But he had an idea that left Texas, and the Southwest, an enduring
gastronomical legacy. Kaiser
Cows - Bovine Saboteurs of WWI 1-25-05
Jake,
the Bridge Ghost of Williamson County 1-17-05Tejano
Hero Norberto Sierra 1-5-04Austin
Grade School 1-1-05Newspaper
Death 12-27-04
The Athenian of East Texas Nice
Politics 12-20-04Big
Foot Wallace and the Indian 12-12-04
Smith had plenty of interesting experiences
during his long life, but one of the best stories he told involved another character
-- Big Foot Wallace. It is a tale of good and evil with a twist.Pardner
Jones 12-12-04
"Jones was the go-to guy for shooting hats off actor’s
heads or cigars out of their mouths. A la William Tell, he also could make instant
apple sauce, albeit with a bullet instead of an arrow."
Buffalo
Man 11-29-04
Hollywood has seldom – if ever – portrayed buffalo hunters
as civilized, erudite men. Screenwriters and producers of Westerns usually have
their buffalo hunters play the role as coarse, scruffy men ready to drink or kill
anything. But as the story of one time buffalo hunter John Cloud Jacobs demonstrates,
reality is not always that simple.
Kate
Ward 11-22-04
Whatever happened to the Kate Ward is far from the most
daunting mystery in Texas history...
Strange
News 11-15-04
Strange news and early 20th century urban folklore
New
Geography 11-4-04
Remapping the Lone Star State
& Place Name
Tweaking of Several Counties and County SeatsPunkin
Center 10-26-04
The Punkin Center Phenomenon, and the old Irish folktale
about Jack-O’-Lantern, the enduring symbol of Halloween.
Which
Road 10-21-04Asherton
10-15-04Covert
Park - Mount Bonnell 10-4-04
Next time you’re in Austin, be sure to visit
Covert Park
Tres
Presidents 9-23-04
Presidents' military records Poison
Doc 9-23-04
Herman Webster Mudgett, America’s first serial killerLost
in the Flood 9-16-04New
York 9-7-04
Its final voyage, and sunken treasure
Donna
8-26-04
Donna Hooks Fletcher, namesake of Donna, TexasAlamo
Monument 8-17-04
In 1912, a San Antonio group began raising money to build
a monument to the defenders of the Alamo. But the memorial they wanted for Alamo
Plaza would not be any run of the mill monument. It would be Texas-sized and then
some, an architectural wonder.
Rooster
8-12-04
Word spread of Houston’s April 21 defeat of Santa Anna at San Jacinto.
Slowly, those who still wanted to give life in Texas a chance turned to the west
and went back to what was left of their homes. And that’s when a nameless hero
gave his all for Texas....
William
Christy 7-29-04
A forgotten Texas hero
Wind
Wagon 7-22-04 Palacios
7-14-04Rust’s
Ride 7-7-04Lost
Painting of Sam Houston 7-1-04Jumper
6-26-04
Jumpers, diving horses and Sonora WebsterSummer
News from 1894Surly
Stranger 6-15-04
Texas Ranger J.W. Fulgham and a Reeves County sheriff’s
deputy ... left Pecos, Texas for a ride down the Pecos River, looking for cattle
thieves or fugitives in early September 1893. Back then, the Pecos was a good
place to find either variety of criminal.... more
Last
Buffalo 6-15-04Slots
5-19-04Kate
5-19-04
Catherine "Kate" Magill Dorman -- a little known Texas heroine of
the Civil War
Leaping
Lovers 5-12-04
Four landmarks known as Lover's Leaps
Racing
Parson 5-1-04
How a preacher held a horse race and build a church Athens
4-27-04
Somewhere in northern Travis County or southern Williamson County
is the site of a long dead dream, a "delightful" community that never was. Joe
4-20-04
Travis' slave, who witnessed his death at the AlamoExcept
Texas 4-11-04
That spring of 1866, more than a year after the last great
battles between North and South, the United States still officially considered
Texas in a state of insurrection.Camp
Bowie 4-2-04
On the night of May 5, 1837, two officers of the Republic
of Texas' army lay asleep in their tent at Camp Bowie. Only one of them would
wake up.
Range
Wisdom 3-25-04
Solomon's wisdom in the free range days
Meteorite
3-21-04
The Williams Ranch meteorite, truth or hoax
Sam
Houston Oak 3-12-04
In the vicinity of the tree on March 14, 1836, Sam
Houston and several hundred Texas citizen-soldiers spent one of the worst nights
of their lives
Alamo
Letters 3-12-04
The surviving words of someone who died in the old Spanish
mission on March 6, 1836.
Tyrant's
Gold 3-2-04
When General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna came to Texas in
1836 he left behind death and destruction -- and possibly gold.
Old
News 2-26-04
Tired of all the new news of war, politics and other forms
of violence? For a change of pace, here's some old news of war, politics and other
forms of violence.
Bevo,
the University of Texas' longhorn mascot 2-20-04
One of the more bizarre
events in Texas collegiate history took place in Austin on a January night in
1920.
Old
Armory 2-12-04
Is there really an historical treasure trove beneath downtown
Austin?
Sarah
"Son," a wise old man once said, "always marry a Texas girl. No matter what
happens, she's seen worse."
Lindsey
City 1-29-04
A ghost town in Big Bend National Park
Hondo
1-20-04
Who made the word Hondo famous?
Cowboy
Gene 1-10-04
Gene Autry the Singing Cowboy McDade
Hanging 12-17-03
The story of the McDade Christmas clean up has become
one of Texas' more frequently told Yuletide tales.
Barbecue
Bust 12-14-03
Where O. Henry, student protests, the Texas governor and
barbecue come together.
Elephant
A wild cowboy tale.
Hunting
Mishaps 11-28-03
Prominent Texans killed while hunting
Tascosa
and Boothill Alien
Camp 11-28-03
World War II alien camp in Crystal City
Lechuza
10-27-03
"Lechuzas have been scaring people in Mexico and South Texas
for a long time.... Lechuzas are witches - brujas - who transform themselves into
birds...."
Range
King 10-27-03
"It can't atone for his murder, or even the apparent
contempt of those who buried him, but at least James W. King lies in a beautiful
cemetery."
Mustang
Gray 10-4-03
Someone wrote a ballad about him that many Texas mothers
used for years as a lullaby...Tennessee
10-25-03
"Texas is probably more indebted to Tennessee for her independence
and subsequent development than to any State in the Union."
Llano
Boom 10-25-03
The Great Llano Uranium Boom
Sipe
Springs 9-14-03
But all that remains today is a mystery written in concrete:
"Who is the little girl, age 3?"
Bikes
9-9-03
In 1897, when a Texas peace officer needed to go somewhere to do his
job, he walked, rode a horse, went in a wagon or took a train. Deputy sheriff
Josh Messenger began using a two-wheeled bicycle.Sergeant
Kelly 8-31-03
The unknown soldier of the Mexican WarBear
Den 8-24-03
"One of the stories Vantine told was about the time he
went hunting for a bear and found an Indian...."
Bluffton
8-17-03
When all the engineering work for the long-contemplated dam was completed
in the mid-1930s, residents of Bluffton received some hard news - the town would
be inundated by the new lake.
Popeye
8-10-03
... So there it is, in black-and-white: Popeye, the Sailor Man is
a native Texan.
Hoo
Doo 8-3-03
A writer of Western fiction could get a dozen movies out of
the Hoo Doo War story...
First
Whites 7-27-03
Being known as an FWC was considered a mark of distinction,
and because of the honor attached to it, sometimes became a point of controversy.
Pearl
7-20-03
He has the singular distinction of being the first and last man legally
hanged in the county.
Cranfill
7-13-03
For about the last quarter of the 19th century ... being a "wet"
or a "dry" defined a Texan politically much more accurately than being Democrat
or Republican....
Two
Braids 7-6-03
More Texans owned horses than automobiles in 1910, but when
the middle-aged man rode into Eagle Pass that summer, people noticed.... Elephant
2003
"Someday, perhaps, a work crew laying cable or pipe will unearth
a large set of bones near a busy Wichita Falls intersection...."A.J.
Sowell 6-25-03 Lion
Hunt 6-11-03News
from Texas 5-28-03
A weekly
column
Since July, 2003 |
Mike
CoxMike
Cox, an elected member of the Texas Institute of Letters, is the author of 20
Texas-related, non-fiction books as well as numerous magazine articles. Author
of a best-selling two-volume narrative history of the Texas Rangers, "The Texas
Rangers: Wearing the Cinco Peso, 1821-1900" and “Time of the Rangers: The Texas
Rangers 1900 to Present,” Cox in September 2010 received the A.C. Greene Award
for lifetime achievement as a writer.
A former award-winning journalist
for the Austin American-Statesman and other Texas newspapers, Cox spent more than
15 years as spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety, handling media
interviews at the scene of some of the biggest news events in recent Texas history.
He retired as communications manager for the Texas Department of Transportation
in 2007, but retired from retirement in 2010 to join the communications division
of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. He still devotes much of his free
time to writing, editing/consulting and public speaking.
October, 2011
A
popular professional speaker, Cox is available to talk to associations, chambers
of commerce and other groups about Texas history. For more information, or to
suggest story ideas or to comment on stories, feel free to contact him at
mikecoxtex@austin.rr.com
or P.O. Box 302559, Austin, TX, 78703-0043 |
Mayhem
at Mount Carmel
by Mike Cox
Excerpt from "Time of the Rangers from 1900 to the Pesent"
The
morning of February 28, 1993... A Texas National Guard helicopter had been shot
down and numerous federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents killed
and wounded while attempting to serve a search warrant at David Koresh’s Branch
Davidian ranch... | | |
|
Books
by Mike Cox
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