Today in Texas History – July 8

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From the Annals of the Vigilantes –  In 1860, fires broke out in North Texas destroying parts of Dallas, Pilot Point and Denton. The most serious fire destroyed downtown Dallas – then a small town.  More than half of the town square in Denton burned, and fire razed a store in Pilot Point.  The likely cause of the fires was a combination of the exceedingly hot summer (with temperatures in the 100’s) and the introduction of new and volatile phosphorous matches.  Citizens of Denton were apparently satisfied with that explanation.  In Dallas, however, radical white leaders had to find a villain.  Charles R. Pryor of the Dallas Herald blamed the assault on an abolitionist plot “to devastate, with fire and assassination, the whole of Northern Texas.”  Stirred up by Pryor’s irresponsible reporting and speculation, several communities and counties throughout North and East Texas established vigilance committees to root out and punish the alleged conspirators. By the time the vigilantes were through, between thirty and 100 blacks and whites had been killed or lynched by mobs.  The Panic of 1860 or the  “Texas Troubles” as dubbed by the press was one more straw on the back of the camel that led to Texas’s secession from the Union.

I Ignored my Wife and Kids, Walked Into Traffic and Couldn’t Shoot a 3-Pointer to Save My Life

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NBA and long-time San Antonio Spurs player, Matt Bonner believes that his iPhone 6 hurt his shooting last season.  Bonner blames the large-screen smartphone for an elbow injury that reduced his shooting percentage last season.  Bonner has been an effective 3-point big man for the Spurs related that that an injury to his left (non-shooting) elbow lasted from early December to the mid-season All-Star break.   As a result, Bonner made 36.5 percent of long-range shots last season, compared to 41.4 percent during his 11-year NBA career.

Bonner told the Concord Monitor, “I hate to make excuses, I was raised to never make excuses, but I went through a two-and-a-half month stretch where I had really bad tennis elbow, and during that stretch it made it so painful for me to shoot I’d almost be cringing before I even caught the ball like, ‘Oh, this is going to kill.’ Everybody is going to find this hilarious, but here’s my theory on how I got it. When the new iPhone came out it was way bigger than the last one, and I think because I got that new phone it was a strain to use it, you have to stretch further to hit the buttons, and I honestly think that’s how I ended up developing it.”

This Just In – Civil War Not Caused by Slavery

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The Washington Post reports that Texas’ new history books will downplay the role of slavery as a root cause of the Civil War.  When history does not comport with your distorted worldview –  just rewrite it.  As Red has previously pointed out, if you don’t think slavery was the root cause of the Civil War, simply read the racist screed that is the Texas Ordinance of Secession.

THIS FALL, Texas schools will teach students that Moses played a bigger role in inspiring the Constitution than slavery did in starting the Civil War. The Lone Star State’s new social studies textbooks, deliberately written to play down slavery’s role in Southern history, do not threaten only Texans — they pose a danger to schoolchildren all over the country.

The Texas board of education adopted a revised social studies curriculum in 2010 after a fierce battle. When it came to social studies standards, conservatives championing causes from a focus on the biblical underpinnings of our legal system to a whitewashed picture of race in the United States won out. The guidelines for teaching Civil War history were particularly concerning: They teach that “sectionalism, states’ rights and slavery” — carefully ordered to stress the first two and shrug off the last — caused the conflict. Come August, the first textbooks catering to the changed curriculum will make their way to Texas classrooms.

It is alarming that 150 years after the Civil War’s end children are learning that slavery was, as one Texas board of education member put it in 2010, “a side issue.” No serious scholar agrees. Every additional issue at play in 1861 was secondary to slavery — not the other way around. By distorting history, Texas tells its students a dishonest and damaging story about the United States that prevents children from understanding the country today. Also troubling, Texas’s standards look likely to affect more than just Texans: The state is the second-largest in the nation, which means books designed for its students may find their way into schools elsewhere, too.

Texas Voters No Longer to do the Two Step

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For nearly 40 years, the Texas Democratic Party has conducted a two tiered method for selecting delegates to the National Convention.  Some delegates (75%) would be apportioned on the basis of the primary vote, but others (25%) would be selected in caucuses held after the polls closed on election day. But the “Texas Two-Step” tradition is officially over. The Democratic National Committee asked the state party to pick between a caucus and a primary and the primary system won out.  Texas Democrats tried to keep that system, but the DNC forced them to pick one, so they went with a primary.  Thus ends the “Texas Two-Step.”   Let the Texas Rhumba begin.

Today in Texas History – July 7

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From the Annals of Short-Lived Promises –  In 1835, the town of Gonzales passed resolutions of loyalty to Mexico.  The resolutions were passed based in part on the influence of the mysterious Edward Gritten. Gritten was reputed to be an Englishman and a long-time resident of Mexico.  He came to Texas in 1834 as secretary to Juan N. Almonte.  He was reported to have worked in the summer of 1835 to repair the fraying connections between the Texas colonists and the Mexican government. He urged the Mexican government to adopt conciliatory measures, assuring them that most Texans were law-abiding Mexican citizens. He was engaged to plead with Martín Perfecto de Cos to avoid any further confrontations and demonstrate that the Texian colonists were peaceful and did not want war or revolution.  However, on the way to Matamoros, Gritten encountered a courier who had orders from Domingo Urgatechea to arrest William B. Travis and others. Gritten returned to San Antonio in a failed attempt to persuade Ugartechea to revoke the orders. Gritten continued his attempts to mediate the disputes between Ugartechea and the colonists. His only official post never came to fruition.  Although, Gritten was elected as collector of the port of Copano, Governor Henry Smith refused to sign the commission because he considered Gritten a spy.  Gritten disappeared from history.  The last information found concerning Gritten is a receipt for money paid him by the government in October 1836 for his services as a translator.

Image of Domingo Urgatechea

Thank God Somebody Finally Figured Out What is Wrong with the UT Football Team

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Short Answer:  They suck!

For an in depth analysis for the ultimate sports geek, please turn to SB Nation which runs through a myriad of statistics and graphical analyses to come up with a precise answer as to why the Longhorns have underperformed over the last 5 years.  And the answer is – They suck! 

To illustrate the Longhorns’ suckiness, SB Nation presents exciting and allegedly meaningful visual aids such as –

Not to mention insightful analysis like –

And if that doesn’t get you excited about the upcoming season, try –

And if you haven’t fallen asleep – Hook ’em.

Texas Pool Seeks Historic Designation

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A Texas shaped pool in Plano (conveniently named Texas Pool) is seeking to be designated as a Texas Historical Landmark according to the Dallas Morning News.    In Texas, a great pool is an historic landmark.  Some of Red’s fondest memories are of hot summer days spent at the local pool completely wasting time with friends while his grandmother patiently kept watch under the aluminum awning on what must have been an incredibly uncomfortable set of bleachers.  If you are in Plano or the environs consider getting a membership at the Texas Pool.  Doing a watermelon off the one meter board into the Panhandle seems irresistible to Red.

Fifty-four years after the Texas Pool’s opening, its board of directors is working to make the pool a Texas historical landmark. Built in 1960 and opened the following year, the 168,000-gallon saltwater pool shaped like Texas has for decades served as a community hub in the Plano suburbs from May to September.

Even though they have not yet confirmed whether theirs is the first Texas-shaped pool, the Texas Pool’s proponents remain convinced it is unique and worthy of historic designation. They say the pool is a remnant of the historic 1950s growth of suburbs that had fueled population growth around the outskirts of Dallas decades ago.

The Texas Pool “is a recapturing of those slow mellow days we’ve lost in our technological race for success,” said Janet Moos, Texas Pool Foundation CEO. “It’s been frozen in time in many ways.”

The Texas Pool wouldn’t be the first pool to be deemed an official historic site. In Austin, the Deep Eddy Pool is listed in the National Register of Historic Places as the oldest pool in Texas, along with the Barton Springs Pool.

For a site to be granted historic designation, its proponents must prove the site is at least 50 years old, maintains structural integrity and has historical significance. The Texas Pool board in particular needs to prove its pool is uniquely noteworthy compared to other Texas-shaped pools and that the pool was part of a historical trend, said Gregory Smith, National Register coordinator for the Texas Historical Commission.

Moos is currently collaborating with the pool’s historian, Cynthia Caton, to search for and compile any historical background about the pool. They say there is no written history for the pool and they lack details about who built the pool and other key players in the pool’s history. They are asking anyone with historical connections to the pool to reach out to them as they compile applications for historical designation. “It really is a matter of finding the right person,” Caton said.

Countdown to Jade Helm, Cont. – Or How Obama is Coming to Take Away our Women, Children and Most Importantly Guns

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Conservative Paranoia over Jade Helm has not subsided according to a recent article in the Washington Post.   For some reason Bastrop continues to be the epicenter for the conspiracy theorist wackos convinced that Obama is coming for them – as if he didn’t have more important things on his plate.  Anyhow, the stalwarts of the Bastrop Republican Party apparently remains convinced that they have but days to live in a free society before the jack booted thugs (read U.S. Military) of the Federal government crack down.  Fortunately, not everyone in Bastrop is bat shit crazy.

The office of the Bastrop County Republican Party is in an old lumber mill on Main Street, with peeling brown paint and a sign out front that captures the party’s feelings about the Obama administration: “WISE UP AMERICA!”

Inside, county Chairman Albert Ellison pulled out a yellow legal pad on which he had written page after page of reasons why many Texans distrust President Obama, including the fact that, “in the minds of some, he was raised by communists and mentored by terrorists.”

So it should come as no surprise, Ellison said, that as the U.S. military prepares to launch one of the largest training exercises in history later this month, many Bastrop residents might suspect a secret Obama plot to spy on them, confiscate their guns and ultimately establish martial law in one of America’s proudly free conservative states.

They are not “nuts and wackos. They are concerned citizens, and they are patriots,” Ellison said of his suspicious neighbors. “Obama has really painted a portrait in the minds of many conservatives that he is capable of this sort of thing.”

Across town at the Bastrop County Courthouse, such talk elicits a weary sigh from County Judge Paul Pape, the chief official in this county of 78,000 people. Pape said he has tried to explain to folks that the exercise, known as Jade Helm 15, is a routine training mission that poses no threat to anyone. . . . “I’m sensitive to the fact that some of our Bastrop residents are concerned, and I’m confident that they are very sincere about their concerns,” Pape said. “But how did we get to this point in our country?”

How indeed?

Today in Texas History – July 6

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From the Annals of Fraternity –  In 1861, the Order of the Sons of Hermann in the State of Texas was founded.  Two representatives of the National Grand Lodge came to San Antonio to organize Harmonia Lodge No. 1 – the first such lodge in Texas.  San Antonio was a likely spot for a new lodge because of the many Germans who had immigrated to central Texas after 1845.  In 1890, the Texas Grand Lodge was established and included the original Harmonia Lodge as well as seven other newly formed lodges in Austin, Taylor, Temple, Waco, La Grange, Brenham, and Houston. . Within a year ninety-two more lodges were formed.  By 1920, the Order of the Sons of Hermann in Texas was financially stronger and had more members than all of the lodges in the rest of the United States.  As a result, the Texas order separated from the national order. Originally all of the members were of German extraction, but by 1965 only about half were, and by 1994 membership was open to all ethnic groups.