Texas Statehood, December 29, 1845 – 169 years ago

It’s Texas Statehood day, the 169th anniversary of Texas joining the Union — or as some Texans prefer, the anniversary of Texas’s making America great.

According to the U.S. flag code, people should fly their U.S. flags on their state’s statehood day.

Not many Texans are, if any. Can you find someone honoring statehood day?

U.S. and Texas flags at the Texas Capitol – photo: jmtimages

169 years ago today: Rub your pet armadillo’s belly, slaughter the fatted longhorn, crank up the barbecue pit with the mesquite wood, put Willie Nelson and Bob Wills on the mp3 player, put the “Giant” DVD on the television, and raise your glass of Big Red, Dr. Pepper, or Lone Star Beer (or Pearl, or Shiner Bock, or Llano Wine).

U.S. Flag Code rules urge flying the U.S. flag on the anniversary of a state’s joining the Union — even as much as that will frost the tiny band of desperate Texas secessionists.  (Will the secessionists fly the Texas flag at half-staff?)

Texas was admitted to the union of the United States of America on December 29, 1845.

President Polk’s Authorization to Affix the Great Seal to Texas Statehood documents – Texas Memorial Museum, University of Texas at Austin

The text of Polk’s message:

I hereby authorize and direct the Secretary of State to affix the Seal of the United States to an authenticated copy of “an act to extend the laws of the United States over the State of Texas and for other purposes” approved Dec. 29, 1845 dated this day, and signed by me and for so doing this shall be his warrant.

James K. Polk
Washington, Dec. 29, 1845

Great Seal of the United States of America, affixed to the Texas Statehood Proclamation – image from State Archives Division, Texas State Library

Resources:

• “Annexation – Celebrating 150 years of statehood,” at Humanities Interactive, Texas Council for the Humanities Resource Center (this page is difficult to find if you just go to the Humanities Interactive site — bookmark it!)
• Teachers Guide from Humanities Interactive
• “Celebrating 150 Years of Texas Statehood,” essay by James L. Haley
• Texas Annexation map activity (with map of U.S. – may be used by classes outside of Texas, too)
• Texas Treasures – Statehood, Texas State Library and Archives Commission
• Texas Statehood Flag, Gallery of the Republic
• Daughters of the Republic of Texas site, with this reminder: Texas Statehood Day [February 19, 1846] (Texas wouldn’t take “yes” for an answer then, either.)
  “The legal entry of Texas into the Union was 29 December 1845, but the decade-old Republic of Texas did not formally transfer the authority to the new State of Texas until 19 February 1846.The Texans had until the end of the year in 1845 to accept the annexation as one of the states of the United States of America. They waited until 29 December 1845 to accept the terms, independent to the end. The formal transfer of authority from the Republic of Texas took place 19 February 1846 at the log capitol in Austin with President Anson Jones presiding. On this day we celebrate the end of the Republic of Texas.”
• Texas Honor Days (days to fly the Texas flag), Daughters of the Republic of Texas
• Stamp honoring 100 years of Texas Statehood (Arago site)

More:

• Iowa Statehood, December 28, 1846 – Iowans, fly your flags today (timpanogos.wordpress.com)
• White House Petition To Let Texas Secede Reaches Goal (dfw.cbslocal.com)
• Priceless documents from Texas’ early days survive a hurricane and a fire (star-telegram.com)
• Texas’ Independence (stuartwilde.com)
• One more time: No, Texas cannot secede; no, Texas can’t split itself (2012 edition) (timpanogos.wordpress.com)
• Secession petitions grow but without legal weight (mysanantonio.com)
• Can Texas Secede from The Union? (cgpgrey.com)
• American columnist John O’Sullivan first used the term “Manifest Destiny” in an article during the summer of 1845. Then President James Polk announced that the United States should aggressively expand into to West today in 1845 which paved the was for the (carl-leonard.com)
• Loud and Proud: Texas Flag Boots from Allens Boots (bootblog.allensboots.com)
• What if Mirabeau Lamar had become King of Texas? Interesting conjecture, and resources, from Time Magazine

The Texas Ranger Museum took note of the day (no, not the baseball Rangers):

On this day in history: Dec 29, 1845: Texas enters the Union. Six months after the congress of the Republic of… http://t.co/r6KjVJuqnm

— Texas Ranger Museum (@txrangermuseum) December 29, 2014

Yes, this is mostly an encore post. It is an annual event, after all. And, fighting ignorance requires patience and persistence.

 

Remembering the worst ever U.S. industrial accident, 1947: 576 dead at Texas City

April 16 marks the 67th anniversary of the Texas City Disaster.

It’s a day Texans, and all Americans should note.  It’s an event we need to remember, because every point of the disaster is something we forget at our very great peril.  Thinking such a disaster could not happen again, and failing to train for these same conditions, contributed to the disaster last year in West, Texas.

67 years ago, in the harbor at Texas City, a large cargo ship being loaded with tons of ammonium nitrate caught fire and exploded, setting fire to other nearby ships, one of which exploded, devastating much of the town. In all, 576 people died in Texas City on April 16 and 17, 1947.

View of Texas City from Galveston, across the bay, after the explosion of the French ship SS Grandchamp, April 16, 1947. Photo from International Association of Fire Fighters Local 1259

The incident also produced one of the most famous tort cases in U.S. history, Dalehite vs. United States, 346 U.S. 15 (1953). (Here is the Findlaw version, subscription may be required.)

The entire Texas City fire department was wiped out, 28 firefighters in all. The International Association of Fire Fighters, Local 1259 has a website dedicated to the history of the disaster, with a collection of some powerful photographs.

More below the fold.

Texas Independence Day, March 2 – fly your Texas flag today

In a meeting hall at Washington-on-the-Brazos, Texans meet to write the Texas Declaration of Independence, released March 2, 1836; image from Portal to Texas History

So, put some barbecue in the smoker, get a Shiner for you and your pet armadillo, sit back and enjoy the holiday.  If you’re near Washington-on-the-Brazos, go to the ceremony.  You’d better be sure you’ve got plenty of Blue Bell Ice Cream.

What?  You don’t get the day off?  You know, Texas schools don’t even take the day off any more.  (In 2014, of course, it’s a Sunday.)

I thought things were going to change when the Tea Party got to Austin and Washington?  What happened?

For Texas Independence Day, it’s appropriate to fly your U.S. flag — or your Texas flag, if you have one.

Original Manuscript, Texas Declaration of Independence, page 1 – Texas State Library and Archives Commission

Text from the image above:

The Unanimous
Declaration of Independence
made by the
Delegates of the People of Texas
in General Convention
at the Town of Washington
on the 2nd day of March 1836

When a government has ceased
to protect the lives, liberty and property
of the people, from whom its legitimate
powers are derived, and for the advance-
ment of whose happiness it was inst-
ituted, and so far from being a guaran-
tee for the enjoyment of those inesti-
mable and inalienable rights, becomes
an instrument in the hands of evil
rulers for their oppression.

[Complete text, and images of each page, at the Texas State Library and Archives Commission site.]

Resources for Texas Independence Day

• Texas Declaration of Independence, at the Online Texas History Handbook
• Portal to Texas History has teacher notes, lesson plans and class exercises
• Historian and author H. W. Brands will be at the Texas Archives in Austin for a lecture (he’s the author of Lone Star Nation, among many other good books), and cake. 11:30 a.m., March 2, 2011.

Resources at Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub

• In 2009, some rare documents related to the Texas Declaration of Independence turned up.
• “Yellow Rose of Texas” and the Battle of San Jacinto (true story, really)
• Texas Independence Day 2008
• Teachers, get ready for San Jacinto Day, April 21

More:

• Events and information, at Celebrate Texas!
• “I am besieged by a thousand or more . . .” at Texas Scribbler
• “Remember Goliad on Texas Independence Day,” Weekend Beercast
• “Independence Day: Students celebrate Texas history,” Killeen Daily Herald

This is mostly an encore post.

Texas Statehood, December 29, 1845 – 168 years ago

U.S. and Texas flags at the Texas Capitol – photo: jmtimages

168 years ago today: Rub your pet armadillo’s belly, slaughter the fatted longhorn, crank up the barbecue pit with the mesquite wood, put Willie Nelson and Bob Wills on the mp3 player, put the “Giant” DVD on the television, and raise your glass of Big Red, Dr. Pepper, or Lone Star Beer (or Pearl, or Shiner Bock, or Llano Wine).

U.S. Flag Code rules urge flying the U.S. flag on the anniversary of a state’s joining the Union — even as much as that will frost the tiny band of desperate Texas secessionists.  (Will the secessionists fly the Texas flag at half-staff?)

Texas was admitted to the union of the United States of America on December 29, 1845.

President Polk’s Authorization to Affix the Great Seal to Texas Statehood documents – Texas Memorial Museum, University of Texas at Austin

The text of Polk’s message:

I hereby authorize and direct the Secretary of State to affix the Seal of the United States to an authenticated copy of “an act to extend the laws of the United States over the State of Texas and for other purposes” approved Dec. 29, 1845 dated this day, and signed by me and for so doing this shall be his warrant.

James K. Polk
Washington, Dec. 29, 1845

Great Seal of the United States of America, affixed to the Texas Statehood Proclamation – image from State Archives Division, Texas State Library

Resources:

• “Annexation – Celebrating 150 years of statehood,” at Humanities Interactive, Texas Council for the Humanities Resource Center (this page is difficult to find if you just go to the Humanities Interactive site — bookmark it!)
• Teachers Guide from Humanities Interactive
• “Celebrating 150 Years of Texas Statehood,” essay by James L. Haley
• Texas Annexation map activity (with map of U.S. – may be used by classes outside of Texas, too)
• Texas Treasures – Statehood, Texas State Library and Archives Commission
• Texas Statehood Flag, Gallery of the Republic
• Daughters of the Republic of Texas site, with this reminder: Texas Statehood Day [February 19, 1846] (Texas wouldn’t take “yes” for an answer then, either.)
  “The legal entry of Texas into the Union was 29 December 1845, but the decade-old Republic of Texas did not formally transfer the authority to the new State of Texas until 19 February 1846.The Texans had until the end of the year in 1845 to accept the annexation as one of the states of the United States of America. They waited until 29 December 1845 to accept the terms, independent to the end. The formal transfer of authority from the Republic of Texas took place 19 February 1846 at the log capitol in Austin with President Anson Jones presiding. On this day we celebrate the end of the Republic of Texas.”
• Texas Honor Days (days to fly the Texas flag), Daughters of the Republic of Texas
• Stamp honoring 100 years of Texas Statehood (Arago site)

More:

• Iowa Statehood, December 28, 1846 – Iowans, fly your flags today (timpanogos.wordpress.com)
• White House Petition To Let Texas Secede Reaches Goal (dfw.cbslocal.com)
• Priceless documents from Texas’ early days survive a hurricane and a fire (star-telegram.com)
• Texas’ Independence (stuartwilde.com)
• One more time: No, Texas cannot secede; no, Texas can’t split itself (2012 edition) (timpanogos.wordpress.com)
• Secession petitions grow but without legal weight (mysanantonio.com)
• Can Texas Secede from The Union? (cgpgrey.com)
• American columnist John O’Sullivan first used the term “Manifest Destiny” in an article during the summer of 1845. Then President James Polk announced that the United States should aggressively expand into to West today in 1845 which paved the was for the (carl-leonard.com)
• Loud and Proud: Texas Flag Boots from Allens Boots (bootblog.allensboots.com)

Much of this post appeared here before; it’s an annual event, after all.

Will Rogers and Wiley Post crashed in Alaska, August 15, 1935

Will Rogers, images from Will Rogers Museums, Oklahoma

August 15, the Ides of August, hosted several significant events through the years.  In 1935, it was a tragic day in Alaska, as an airplane crash took lives of Will Rogers and Wiley Post.  To refresh your memory, an encore post, with a few edits and additions.

After Mark Twain died, America found another great humorist, raconteur, story-teller, who tickled the nation’s funny-bone and pricked the collective social conscience at the same time. Will Rogers is most famous today for his sentiment that he never met a man he didn’t like. In 1935, he was at the height of his popularity, still performing as a lariat-twirling, Vaudeville comedian who communed with presidents, and kept his common sense. He wrote a daily newspaper column that was carried in 500 newspapers across America.  Rogers was so popular that Texas and Oklahoma have dueled over who gets the bragging rights in claiming him as a native son.

Will Rogers ready to perform. Photo taken prior to 1900 – Wikimedia

Wiley Post was known as one of the best pilots in America. He gained fame by being the first pilot to fly solo around the world. Post was famous for his work developing new ways to fly at high altitudes. Post was born in Texas and moved to Oklahoma. He lost an eye in an oil-field accident in 1924, then used the settlement money to buy his first airplane. He befriended Will Rogers when flying Rogers to an appearance at a Rodeo, and the two kept up their friendship literally to death.

Post asked Rogers to come along on a tour of the great unknown land of Alaska, where Post was trying to map routes for mail planes to Russia. Ever adventurous, Rogers agreed — he could file his newspaper columns from Alaska by radio and telephone. On August 15, 1935, their airplane crashed near Point Barrow, Alaska, killing them both.

Wiley Post, first to fly solo around the world, in an early pressure suit for high-altitude flying – Wikimedia photo

On August 15, 2008, a ceremony in Claremore, Oklahoma, honored the two men on the 73rd anniversary of their deaths. About 50 pilots from Oklahoma, Missouri, Kansas and Arkansas will fly in to the Claremore Airport for the Will Rogers-Wiley Post Fly-In Weekend. Oklahoma Lt. Gov. Jari Askins will offer a tribute.

Rogers was 56, leaving behind his wife, Betty, and four children. Post, 36, left a widow.

Rogers’ life is really quite legendary. Historian Joseph H. Carter summed it up:

Will Rogers was first an Indian, a cowboy then a national figure. He now is a legend.

Born in 1879 on a large ranch in the Cherokee Nation near what later would become Oologah, Oklahoma, Will Rogers was taught by a freed slave how to use a lasso as a tool to work Texas Longhorn cattle on the family ranch.
As he grew older, Will Rogers’ roping skills developed so special that he was listed in the Guinness Book of Records for throwing three lassos at once: One rope caught the running horse’s neck, the other would hoop around the rider and the third swooped up under the horse to loop all four legs.

Will Rogers’ unsurpassed lariat feats were recorded in the classic movie, “The Ropin’ Fool.”

His hard-earned skills won him jobs trick roping in wild west shows and on the vaudeville stages where, soon, he started telling small jokes.

Quickly, his wise cracks and folksy observations became more prized by audiences than his expert roping. He became recognized as being a very informed and smart philosopher–telling the truth in very simple words so that everyone could understand.

After the 10th grade, Will Rogers dropped out of school to become a cowboy in a cattle drive. He always regretted that he didn’t finish school, but he made sure that he never stopped learning–reading, thinking and talking to smart people. His hard work paid off.

Will Rogers was the star of Broadway and 71 movies of the 1920s and 1930s; a popular broadcaster; besides writing more than 4,000 syndicated newspaper columns and befriending Presidents, Senators and Kings.

During his lifetime, he traveled around the globe three times– meeting people, covering wars, talking about peace and learning everything possible.

He wrote six books. In fact he published more than two million words. He was the first big time radio commentator, was a guest at the White House and his opinions were sought by the leaders of the world.

Inside himself, Will Rogers remained a simple Oklahoma cowboy. “I never met a man I didn’t like,” was his credo of genuine love and respect for humanity and all people everywhere. He gave his own money to disaster victims and raised thousands for the Red Cross and Salvation Army.

Post’s legacy is significant, too. His employer, Oklahoma oil man F. C. Hall, encouraged Post to push for aviation records using Hall’s Lockheed Vega, and Post was happy to comply. Before his history-making trip around the world, he had won races and navigation contests. NASA traces the development of the space-walking suits worn by astronauts to Post’s early attempts for flight records:

For Wiley Post to achieve the altitude records he sought, he needed protection. (Pressurized aircraft cabins had not yet been developed.) Post’s solution was a suit that could be pressurized by his airplane engine’s supercharger.

First attempts at building a pressure suit failed since the suit became rigid and immobile when pressurized. Post discovered he couldn’t move inside the inflated suit, much less work airplane controls. A later version succeeded with the suit constructed already in a sitting position. This allowed Post to place his hands on the airplane controls and his feet on the rudder bars. Moving his arms and legs was difficult, but not impossible. To provide visibility, a viewing port was part of the rigid helmet placed over Post’s head. The port was small, but a larger one was unnecessary because Post had only one good eye!

Last photo of Will Rogers (in the hat) and Wiley Post, in Alaska in 1935 (from Century of Flight)

Tip of the old scrub brush to Alaska bush advocate Pamela Bumsted.

Resources:

• Will Rogers Memorial Museums, Oklahoma
• Will Rogers State Park, California
• Wiley Post biography at the Centennial of Flight Commission site (meeting technology and geography standards)
• Will Rogers in Schools program (Oklahoma)
• Will Rogers’ collected newspaper columns, “Daily Telegrams”
• Roadside America listing of the crash memorial in Point Barrow
• Wiley Post and the Winnie Mae (AcePilots)
• Will Rogers Coliseum, Ft. Worth, Texas
• Will Rogers World Airport, Oklahoma City (OKC)
• Wiley Post Airport, Bethany, Oklahoma
• Wretched Richard’s Almanac: Will Power (richarddaybell.wordpress.com)

Amazon haiku to Sen. Wendy Davis’s pink Mizuno shoes

(Yes, you’re right — the shoes are red, not pink.)

Texas State Sen. Wendy Davis‘s filibuster so insinuated itself into our culture already that it is now a part of shoe reviews at Amazon.com:

Mizuno running shoes for sale at Amazon.com — the same shoes Sen. Wendy Davis wore during her filibuster on June 25, 2012.

Customer Review

147 of 150 people found the following review helpful

SHOES HAIKUS, June 27, 2013

By

mistersnoid “mistersnoid”

This review is from: Mizuno Women’s Wave Rider 16 Running Shoe (Apparel)

Wendy wore these, and
she wasn’t even running.
Here’s hopes she soon will!

Standing and talking,
one needs a lot of support.
You have all of ours.

More:

• More on Wendy Davis (GreenMountainDaily.com)
• Wendy Davis and the Sneaker-Selling Filibuster (businessweek.com)
• Wendy Davis’ filibuster shoes praised in Amazon reviews (news.cnet.com)
• Wendy Davis’ Filibuster Shoes Sprint to 5 Stars on Amazon (abcnews.go.com)
• Snarky Amazon users review Wendy Davis’s filibuster shoes (dailydot.com)
• Wendy Davis’ filibustering sneakers get some ‘Amazon’-sized love (today.com)
• Standing in Wendy Davis’ Hot Pink Shoes (hispanicbusiness.com)
• Here’s what Amazon commenters are saying about Wendy Davis’s shoes (washingtonpost.com)
• Amazon Reviewers Praise the Patriarchy-Busting Power of Wendy Davis’ Filibuster Shoes (themarysue.com)
• Wendy Davis’ Running Shoes Keep Fighting the Patriarchy…On Amazon (fastcoexist.com)

Mizuno’s red running shoes, worn by Texas Sen. Wendy Davis. Image from Outside the Beltway

Related articles

• Amazon Reviewers Praise the Patriarchy-Busting Power of Wendy Davis’ Filibuster Shoes (themarysue.com)
• Wendy Davis’ Running Shoes Keep Fighting the Patriarchy…On Amazon (fastcoexist.com)

Dallas crime history: Deaths of Bonnie and Clyde, May 23, 1934

Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, notorious bank-robbing outlaws from Oak Cliff, Texas, ran into a police ambush and were shot to death on May 23, 1934, in Bienville Parish, Louisiana.

Bonnie and Clyde in 1933, about a year before their deaths – Wikimedia image

Though they wished to be buried together, her family protested. They are buried in separate cemeteries in Dallas. Bonnie is buried in the Crown Hill Cemetery off of Webb Chapel Road in Dallas (do not confuse with the Crown Hill Cemetery in Indianapolis). Clyde is buried in the Western Heights Cemetery off of Fort Worth Boulevard, in Oak Cliff (now a part of Dallas).

Borrowed originally with express permission from a Wayback Machine; expanded and edited here.

More:

• Bonnie & Clyde – A First Look (HISTORY/Lifetime/A&E) (scifiandtvtalk.typepad.com)
• Adios, Bonnie & Clyde… (thomaspluck.com)
• Liam Neeson and Woody Harrelson to play the “Highwaymen” who killed Bonnie & Clyde (irishcentral.com)
• Account at Nobody Move!

Additional photo resources:

US Department of Justice, Division of Investigation identification order for Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. Image via Wikipedia

“Posse members suffered deafness for hours after unleashing the thunderous fusillade” Wikipedia image

The grave of Clyde Barrow – Wikipedia image

The grave of Bonnie Parker – Wikipedia image

You should recall Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty in their movie turn as Bonnie and Clyde.  But Serge Gainsborough and Brigitte Bardot, in French?  From 1968: