*I have always loved datelines and stories from the road – “14,500 feet up in the High Andes above Cañar, Ecuador, South America” is always a much more promising starting point than “Staring at the brick wall above my incredibly messy desk…”* So: Dateline: APR 15… MEACHAM FIELD, Fort Worth …
For several years I’ve been driving past this little sign just off Holcombe Boulevard… “Houston Maritime Museum –>” and, for several years, I’ve been making mental notes: Go Check This Out. But mental notes are of limited use when you’re in the habit of losing your mind every week or …
Well, not all of us. But the last several months have been fairly, well, unstable, depressing, and generally unpleasant, and as I don’t like inflicting that sort of nonsense on you guys, I’ve been just keeping my head down, mostly. But it turns out that a man can get really …
Rumors of our demise are somewhat overstated. But the next piece here has some learning and some more research to be done, so it’s taking longer than I thought. Learning comes slower these days; I think my brain’s getting full. Or stuck. Or something. Anyway, here’s a sneak preview. And …
Decided last week that cabin fever was settling in and I needed to get out again, so I sorted through the various events and places on my “gotta do this sometime” list and eventually settled on A Plan. In Four Parts. Part One: catch the time machine back to the …
It’s taken a wee bit longer to get to this than I’d planned. Life does that. I talked earlier about Las Pastorelas; now I’d like to go one step back from that and present a few things from Las Posadas. The reenactment of Las Posadas (Posada is Spanish for “inn” …
A little over a year ago, early in December of 2014, I read on a website that Mission Espiritu Santo in Goliad was hosting a Pastorela, a Shepherds’ Play, for Christmas, and knew that was my next trip. I’d learned about Pastorelas some time in the Long Ago, but never …
A few years ago the Texas Historical Commission started doing some research and documentary work on the old highways in Texas. Several of them still exist, it turns out, at least in bits and pieces and little sprinklings of history across the state. The Bankhead Highway, one of the first …
It’s like St. Patrick’s Day, but without the green beer. It’s what a national holiday looks like when it’s celebrated in another country by large groups of people, most of whom have at best a marginal tie to the Auld Sod or La Patria Hermosa. In short, it’s an excuse …
Galveston, Texas, 19 June 1865 Major-General Gordon Granger, USA, arrives in Galveston to assume command of the Federal Department of Texas. Within hours, he announces, via General Order #3, that slavery has ended in Texas and that all formerly enslaved persons are now free. “The people of Texas are informed …