Rosenwald Schools
Black children in the South attended segregated schools that were dilapidated. They used books castoff from white schools. At times they attended classes in churches and lodge halls because the local school board did not provide buildings for black students. Two men worked to change all that. Booker T. Washington, founder of Tuskegee Institute and […]
Niles City: “Richest Little City in Texas”
Three miles north of Fort Worth’s business center, Niles City, a tiny strip of land spreading over a little more than one-half square mile and boasting a population of 508, incorporated in 1911. Within its bounds sat the Fort Worth Stock Yards, Swift & Company, Armour & Company, two grain elevators, and a cotton-oil company, […]
Log Church Cathedral
A one-room log church sits on a lane leading off a country road in Wesley a farming community between Houston and Austin. Wesley boasts the first Czech school in Texas that started here in 1859 when the town was called Veseli meaning “joyous.” The church building, erected in 1866, housed the community school and the […]
Texas Capitol Paid For in Land
The Texas Constitution of 1876 set aside three million acres in the Panhandle to fund construction of the state’s fourth capitol. Big land giveaways in Texas started in 1749 when the Spanish Colonial government began establishing villas along the Rio Grande. Mexico continued the practice of granting empresarial contracts to establish colonies in Texas. The Republic […]
A CENTURY OF CHAUTAUQUA
An octagonal-shaped wooden building in Waxahachie began hosting hundreds and then thousands of enthusiastic farmer families and small-town residents from all over North Texas when it opened in 1902. They came in wagons and on horseback to camp out for a week to ten days; they slept in tents and under their wagons; and for the […]
AUSTIN’S MOONLIGHT TOWERS
From dusk to dawn, travelers entering Austin, especially those heading to the downtown fun spots, often notice sprinkled all over the older part of town clusters of six moon-like lights glowing atop strange metal contraptions. The 165-foot structures are Austin’s Moonlight Towers. They started illuminating the central part of the city in 1894 when the […]
Elissa: Texas’ Tall Ship
She is a pricey lady, but Galvestonians claim her as their own and money seems not to be a concern when it comes to preserving this beauty. As far as anyone knows she only visited the island twice but she is a prize the city is proud to sail and show. Built in 1877 in […]
LINDHEIMER: FATHER OF TEXAS BOTANY
If you have heard of the Texas prickly pear cactus, the Texas yellow star daisy, milkweed and loco weed, or the Texas rat snake, you may be surprised to know all five derive their scientific name from Ferdinand Jacob Lindheimer—a botanist who scoured the wilds of Texas in the 1830s and 40s to discover several […]
POWER BY DESIGN
In the last half of the nineteenth century, the most powerful men in Texas called Galveston home. The Strand, a street stretching five blocks along the docks, wore the moniker of Wall Street of the Southwest. Two-dozen millionaires officed along the route, controlling Texas’ shipping, banks, insurance companies, and the vast cotton export business. One […]