From the Annals of Country Folklore  –  In 1951, the “John Henry Faulk” show was first broadcast on  WCBS.  Faulk was from Austin and considered to be a master story-teller.  The show featured Faulk’s humor as well as music and some listener participation.  The show lasted for six years when it was discontinued largely because of the Cold War and McCarthyite blacklisting of the 1950s.  Because of his political views, Faulk was branded a Communist by AWARE, Inc.  a company that allegedly investigated the political attitudes of entertainers.  The ridiculous charge resulted in a spineless CBS removing Faulk from the airwaves.  Faulk sued AWARE in 1957 and ultimately recovered $3.5 million which was the largest libel judgment in history to that date.  Faulk’s book, Fear on Trial, described his battle against AWARE.  Austin TV and Radio personality Cactus Pryor was a major Faulk supporter during his blacklist troubles.  Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson resisted pressure to remove Pryor from his position because of his support for Faulk.   Faulk later appeared on Hee Haw.  He died in Austin in 1990.

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From the Annals of the Marx Brothers  –  In 1826, Benjamin Edwards and about 30 men arrived in the then Mexican village of Nacogdoches and boldly proclaimed himself as the ruler of the new Republic of Fredonia.  Edwards was the brother of Empresario Haden Edwards who had received a grant near Nacogdoches and had settled 50 families in the area.  While his brother was away in the U.S. raising money for the colony, Edwards apparently became concerned that they were about to lose their land and foolishly decided to declare independence from Mexico.  Edwards believed that many of the American settlers would support his attempt to break away from Mexico.  Accompanied by his men, Edwards seized a stone fort in Nacogdoches and declared independence for the new “Republic of Fredonia” which he claimed extended from from the Sabine River to the Rio Grande River.  The new nation would be governed under the principles of “Independence, Liberty, and Justice.”

Mexico moved quickly to suppress the rebellion forcing Edwards to negotiate an agreement with the Cherokee nation offering to share Texas in exchange for military aid.  But Edwards failed to gain much support from the local Anglo and Mexican residents of Nacogdoches. Consequently, Edwards’ ill-conceived and poorly executed revolution quickly fell apart as soon as the Mexican militia approached Nacogdoches.  He fled back to the U.S. and his brief moment in history was gone.

From the Annals of the Cattle Barons –  In 1929, Charles Goodnight, co-founder of the famous Goodnight-Loving Trail, died at the age of 93.  Goodnight came to  Texas at the age of 9 and was apparently born to live the rugged frontier life.  Using his frontier and scouting skills he was appointed as a regimental guide during the Civil War. By the end of the war, Goodnight had somehow built up a herd of cattle on his ranch in Palo Pinto County.  Combining his ranching and trailblazing skills, Goodnight decided to drive his cattle to New Mexico and Colorado instead of the standard route to the railheads in Abilene and other towns in Kansas for shipment East.

In preparing for the long drive, Goodnight met Oliver Loving, another cattleman similarly noted for his frontier and livestock skills. Loving joined with Goodnight and in 1866, they blazed a 500-mile route from Fort Belknap, Texas, to Fort Sumner, New Mexico, which became known as the Goodnight-Loving Trail. The Trail quickly became one the most heavily used cattle trails in the Southwest.  The route entailed risks as demonstrated when Loving was killed by Commanches in his third trip on the trail.

In 1875, Goodnight extended the trail from New Mexico to Colorado and then retired from trail driving to work on his new ranch in Colorado.  Unfortunately, that venture was a failure and Goodnight was forced to relocate his remaining cattle to Palo Duro Canyon.  With help from other investors, Goodnight built the JA Ranch into a hugely profitable operation eventually running more than 100,000 cattle. At his death he was recognized as one of the great cattle barons of Texas.

From the Annals of Fascism –  In 1941, Germany declared war on the U.S.  The U.S. had been officially neutral in the European conflict until that point, but the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor changed everything.  Adolf Hitler had an oral agreement with Japan that Germany would join a war against the United States, but the sneak attack surprised even him. On December 8, Japanese Ambassador Oshima met with German Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop to secure Germany’s agreement to declare war against the U.S. Germany and Japan were parties to the Axis Power’s  Tripartite Pact, which promised help if Japan was attacked.  But here Japan was the aggressor and Germany was not obligated to assist. Von Ribbentrop rightly calculated that the entry of the U.S. into the European Theater would assure a German defeat.

Hitler had other ideas and was convinced that a declaration of war from the U.S. was imminent.  A low grade war in the Atlantic was already underway with the U.S. Navy attacking German U-boats.  Hitler also miscalculated the ability of Japan to win the Pacific War believing that it would defeat the U.S. and then attack Russia from the east.  A delusional Hitler ordered the German charge d’affaires in Washington to deliver a declaration of war to American Secretary of State Cordell Hull.

In his address to the Reichstag to defend the declaration, Hitler was at his odious best claiming that the failure of New Deal was the real cause of the war and that Roosevelt, supported by plutocrats and Jews, were attempting to divert attention from America’s economic troubles. “First he incites war, then falsifies the causes, then odiously wraps himself in a cloak of Christian hypocrisy and slowly but surely leads mankind to war,” declared Hitler.  The members of the Reichstag leaped to their feet in thunderous applause. One can only hope that they all died miserable and painful deaths.

By the end of the war some 750,000 Texans, including 12,000 women, served in the armed forces. Most served in the Army or the Army Air Force, but nearly one-fourth served in the navy, marines, or the coast guard. During the war 22,022 Texans were killed or died of wounds. One-third of these fatalities were in the navy, marines, or coast guard.

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