Carole Sikes Artist / Writer in Austin, Texas

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about Borger, Texas ? The town of Borger was a significant oil boomtown in the twentieth century but greed got it off to a very wrong start. It is located in the panhandle of Texas which became a leading area for the production of oil. In 1920, Amarillo was the largest panhandle town with a population of 15,494. Borger had more four footed inhabitants than two footed, but this did not deter two brothers from Missouri buying 2140 acres of land for $12,000. They posted sensational advertisements for finding black gold in the new town on the plains suddenly making it the 6th largest town in Texas. Forty five thousand men and women had arrived._____________________ Asa Phillip Borger, one of the brothers had his vision for the Borger Townsite Company. “Ace” brought a lawyer to be his trouble shooter. “Two Gun” Dick Herwig, a convicted murderer, bought his way out of prison to become Borger’s Marshall. Illegal distilleries supplied rot gut whiskey for Ace’s saloons, open ...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about Spindletop? Spindletop was the first successful oil well in Texas located atop a minimal mound near Beaumont in the Gulf coastal area. Research and reference for this story is the comprehensive history of Texas written by Stephen Harrigan. ______________________________________________ I quote, “Oil was never discovered in Texas; it was just always there. It was the scum that the surviving members of the DeSoto and Moscoso expedition had found seeping up out of the Texas surf in 1543 and then used to seal gaps in their leaky handmade rafts…” Native Americans used it as a salve and a lubricant and to patch their canoes. Anglo settlers found petroleum blobs in ponds between the Brazos and Sabine Rivers and called them “sour lakes” because of the gaseous smell._____________ In 1859, the oil industry was founded in Pennsylvania. Crude oil was refined into kerosene and used mainly for lighting. Texas followed with an oil industry of energy prominence. However the ...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about the XIT Ranch? Because Texas had been a republic prior to statehood, it owned its land that was abundant especially in the relatively unpopulated western areas. The first primitive capitol building was destroyed by fire. So in 1882, the State Legislature appropriated three million acres of state land in the panhandle of Texas to finance a new capitol. Mathias Schnell of Rock Island, Illinois formed the Capitol Syndicate (*) of wealthy investors from Chicago to London to purchase the vast amount of undeveloped range land. Many never intended to be ranchers but that is what they became.__________ It was U.S. investor, Col. Amos C. Babcock’s party that went to survey the property on the border of New Mexico. At Fort Elliott he was given a four mule ambulance, a wagon to haul camping equipment and a small tent. With him was his surveyor, a county clerk, several cowboys and a Mexican cook. They traveled 950 miles and it took 36 days to inspect the land. Babcoc...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about the King Ranch? Cattle comes to mind of course, but so much else! It is one of the largest privately held corporations in the U.S. It covers 1,300 square miles and six south Texas counties. It has world-wide cattle operations; owns more than 50,000 acres of timberland; operates hundreds of oil and gas wells; is a major player in agribusiness, cotton, pecans, leather, farm equipment, Ford’s King Ranch truck, etc. Quarter horses are raised and raced. Assault won the Triple Crown in 1946 and in 1950 Middle Ground won the Derby and Belmont.________________ Richard King came to the coast of Texas from Pennsylvania. He and his friend Mifflin Kenedy started as traders, then dominated commerce in south Texas by shipping goods in their steamboats. Eventually both became ranchers. In 1852, King started a cattle camp on Santa Gertrudis Creek in South Texas. He bought several land grants to which he added acreage that became home to 100 men, woman and children from Mexico kn...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about Quanah Parker? Quanah Parker was one of a kind. The son of a Comanche war chief and a white woman, he grew to become a man of two worlds.___________________ On a day when the tribesmen and boys were out hunting, their village was raided by Texas Rangers. Only the women and a few braves were there and most were killed except Quanah’s mother who fled on horseback with her infant daughter. However she was chased, captured, and identified as a white woman named Cynthia Ann Parker. She was returned to a white settlement where Parker relations lived. It is believed that Peta Nocona, Quanah’s father, lived another 3 or 4 years before his two sons became orphans.___________________ The vast area called Comancheria had an eastern boundary through Austin and Llano north to the Red River. It included all of the Panhandle of Texas and the south plains to approximately Interstate 10. Before 1860, it was half of Texas plus parts of New Mexico and Oklahoma. Quana...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about Cynthia Ann Parker? PERHAPS you have heard her tale. She was abducted twice. First when nine years old, she was taken by a Comanche band that had raided her parents’ ranch near Ft. Parker and bludgeoned her father to death in 1836. Thirty-three years later, Texas Rangers rescued the blue eyed squaw and her infant daughter but it was actually a second abduction. She had completely assimilated into life in the tribe. Later a son named Quanah would become a chief but that is another story for later. ____________________ The U. S. Commissioner of Indian Affairs in Texas had attempted to establish reserves where Native Americans could live and farm protected from aggressive white men and Indian fighters but it was complicated. Hatred existed between the lawless white men believing they were entitled to raw land in the new territory and the bands of Comanche who refused life on a reservation preferring the wild open plains. Some of the other tribes were aligned with Te...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about Cynthia Ann Parker? PERHAPS you have heard her tale. She was abducted twice. First when nine years old, she was taken by a Comanche band that had raided her parents’ ranch near Ft. Parker and bludgeoned her father to death in 1836. Thirty-three years later, Texas Rangers rescued the blue eyed squaw and her infant daughter but it was actually a second abduction. She had completely assimilated into life in the tribe. Later a son named Quanah would become a chief but that is another story for later._______________________________ The U. S. Commissioner of Indian Affairs in Texas had attempted to establish reserves where Native Americans could live and farm protected from aggressive white men and Indian fighters but it was complicated. Hatred existed between the lawless white men believing they were entitled to raw land in the new territory and the bands of Comanche who refused life on a reservation preferring the wild open plains. Some of the other tribes were alig...

In my WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT Indians in Texas: I intended to say The Karankawa fishermen were reputed to be cannibalistic... Thanks to Eilene for catching it. My apology for this and once again for not being able to maintain the paragraphing in my orginally typed stories when I cut and paste them to this blog. If anyone more tech savvy than I can enlighten me, please do. Thanks Carole

I will attempt to use tribal names when possible. I ask for your understanding when space begs that I use the briefer reference of Indians rather than the more proper Native Americans. The western plains of Texas were rich hunting grounds for the Comanche, Apache and Kiowa tribal bands seeking the herds of bison. Hunting was fiercely competitive and ceremonial. The warrior chiefs wore their elaborate feathered head-dresses to hunt. Some chiefs had dozens of wives doing domestic work. Buffalo meat was hung, dried and soup was made. Butchering was done by women who also stretched hides on large frames to cover tepees and make blankets that were stacked for beds on which the men lounged and the children slept. The women in charge were distinguished by the clothing they wore. They often wore a blanket over their deerskin dresses and were adorned with handmade jewelry. Horses had been brought and left in the new world by the failed Spanish explorers looking for gold and the returni...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about Castroville, Texas In 1844, a ship of mostly farmers landed on the Gulf Coast of Texas to travel overland, past San Antonio, upstream on the Medina River. Two deer, three bears and one alligator were killed before reaching Henri Castro’s land grant from the Republic of Texas. The 36 future Texas colonists from Alsace-Lorraine, a territory of France, were led by Captain John C. Hays and his Texas Rangers to what would become called “Little Alsace.”________ For the next five years the settlers endured Comanche raids, a drought, invasion of locusts and a Cholera epidemic.(*) The town was patterned after a European village. The very un-Texan houses were on small lots and narrow lanes, usually two stories tall, made of timber and rough cut stone that was plastered, with thatched roofs. Surrounding the houses were individual farming plots.________ The first church in Castroville and also the first in the county of Medina was St. Louis Catholic Church. Fin...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about Spanish Texas? It is believed that the shoreline from Florida to Texas was first viewed by a Spaniard as early as 1519. Spanish explorers came long before the English settled the Atlantic Coast of North America______ Strong, proud Spain struggled to persuade its own citizens to colonize the vast and remote lands in North America, so in 1820, it opened up Texas to Anglo Americans. After Mexico became independent from Spain in 1821, sparsely populated Texas became part of the Mexican Nation. Both Mexicans and U. S. citizens, wanting inexpensive land to farm and ranch, flocked to Tejas. This accounts for the myriad of Spanish names for towns, counties, rivers and creeks, mountains and islands.______ Spaniards brought horses. Many became wild, multiplied and were acquired and tamed by Indians. Spanish laws had established land ownership, water rights, community property and inheritance by daughters and widows. Crops were brought and irrigation was implemented. Pre...

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WHAT DO YOU KNOW about the Alamo? Much has been written about the Alamo. The battle of the colonists and the revolutionaries in the Mexican state of Tejas against the Mexican General Santa Anna’s army is one of the great defeats that has been romanticized and made legendary. So what does one say that hasn’t already been said? Jason Stanford, along with two others, has written a book entitled Forget the Alamo, the rise and fall of the American myth. To hear what he had to say I viewed a webinar. He discussed some Alamo myths that we have come to celebrate and enjoy. Labeling the tale “a white supremacy myth,” he did conclude that one can still enjoy Christmas without believing in Santa Claus. Stanford is an educator. As best I could tell without reading his book, the intent or theme is to debunk the white heroes and save the brown children from being uncomfortable in Texas History classes. He cited three Alamo heroes, all tall, intelligent and instinctive warriors. Davy Crockett, an ...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about Cedar Choppers? Cedar Choppers came from Appalachia and the Ozark Mountains to the hill country of Texas in the mid-1800s. They were fiercely independent and reclusive from city folk. Living in tents and dirt floor shacks, near creeks with clear drinkable water, they never considered themselves Austinites. There were multiple settlements located on Bull Creek (*) and Shoal Creek in west Austin and Cypress Creek near the Anderson Mill on the Colorado River (now Lake Travis). Farther upstream on the river was Sandy Creek and north east of there were settlements at Leander and Liberty Hill. Across the river from the township of Austin there were settlements in West Lake Hills at Eanes, Bee Cave, Barton Creek and in Oak Hill. The hillbilly population was easily two generations behind mainstream America.______ It’s important to know that trees growing in cedar brakes in that day were not like the scrub or sap cedar in the hills today. Ash Juniper had tall straight t...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about Steiner Ranch? Steiner Ranch is a subdivision with million dollar homes, offices and apartments galore. There are elementary schools, shops, and a spa, plus the 18 hole U.T. Golf Club, and Longhorn Village Retirement community. It stretches from a long waterfront on Lake Austin to hills overlooking Lake Travis. If dining at Bobby Steiner’s Steak House one can watch the sun set over sail boats in the lake below. By 1895, Texas cattle drives were over. While David B. Barrow senior was buying land to expand Austin by creating Northwest Hills subdivision, (mid 1950) Buck Steiner, only 20 miles away, was hiring cowboys to roundup his steers and truck them to markets. I called son Tommy Steiner several years ago when writing about Steiner Ranch in my book. (*) He told me a story about a boy that his father raised on the ranch. Ben took on the nick name “Humpy” when he was old enough to ride bulls at rodeos. Buck assigned Humpy to drive a truck full of Steiner cattle ...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about the Old 300? The “Old 300” (actually 297) were the first Anglo families to form a colony in the Mexican state of Tejas. Moses Austin was a Missouri businessman with many varied investments, including mining, banking and others. He educated his son Stephen in the east. As a result of his business ventures, Moses Austin had much indebtedness and the financial panic of 1819 was devastating for him and his family. While attempting to settle his debts, he became ill and died leaving his vision of a colony in the Mexican state (Coahuila y Tejas) to son his Stephen F. Austin. Before his death, Moses Austin had begun seeking persons eager to acquire new land. However it was his son Stephen who dutifully, but with reluctance, took up his late father’s project and brought the new settlers to Texas from the years 1822 to 1824. The “families” were loosely defined. Some were people of means. Some were traditional families with children. Others were couples,...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about “PA and MA” Ferguson? Because Texas was an agrarian state, James Ferguson (1871-1944) took on the nickname name “Farmer Jim” and made his first run for public office while only in his 40s. He became governor of Texas. Born on a farm near Salado, Texas, he was kicked out of a prestigious school when he was 16, wandered in the west for several years, then returned to be a lawyer. He never attended a law school but passed the bar with help from friends of his circuit riding father. James is described as “magnetic, grandiose, a bully and a crook.” (*) By contrast his wife, Miriam Amanda Wallace (1875-1961) was introverted, apolitical, and daughter of a nearby rancher/preacher. “Even if I had the right to vote I wouldn’t do it” she said. Ferguson posed as a Democrat-populist farmer but he had a chauffeur. His wife’s money bought a big house, a farm and interest in a bank. As an anti-prohibitionist, campaign money came from brewers. Speeches were drafted on pages fro...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about the Texas State Cemetery? If you read Michael Barnes’ two recent features about the cemetery in the Austin American Statesman you already know more than I can add. Perhaps an impetus for his article was journalist Julian Read’s recent interment there. Julian was a resident in Westminster Retirement Community. He is certainly not the only, nor will he be the last Westminster resident to be recognized for public service with a resting place in our beautiful State Cemetery.________ Huge trees shade the gravesites of individuals who have made both major and minor marks in the history books of Texas. Stephen F. Austin’s remains were transported from his sister’s land and reinterred in the city named for him.________ Early settler Joseph Wilbarger lived many years after Indians scalped him and left him to die near the Colorado River. His remains are in the cemetery. There is a monument honoring Susanna Dickinson, survivor of the Alamo, but she is buried at nearby Oakw...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about the French Legation?________ The French Legation was originally the private home of Count Jean Pierre Isadore Alphonse Dubois de Saligny (1841). As a lesser French diplomat, the Charge d’ Affairs entertained politicians of the new Republic of Texas hoping for legislative favors which never came. If you read my story about Dubois and the “Pig War”(1) you will know the details of his disastrous few years in the very rudimentary village of Austin, resulting in his recall to France.________ In 1849, Dr. Joseph W. Robertson bought the property as a home. He and his wife had 11 children and 9 enslaved workers. Later the former Legation was purchased by the State of Texas making it a museum. The Daughters of the Republic were appointed its custodians. DRT member “Miss Lillie” Robertson became enthusiastic keeper of its history and tour guide.________ The DRT and Violet Crown Garden Club (2) hired landscape architect Charles Pinkney (1906-1994) and iron worker For...

WHAT DO YOU KNOW about Texas inventors? There were some who were tinkers and struck it rich quite by surprise, others were creative thinkers finding solutions to problems, and my last example was man who inherited millions from his father but also made a name for himself. ________ In 1829 Texas was still part of Mexico. Gail Borden Jr. joined his father who printed the newspaper in San Felipe, an early Texas settlement. The father-son team printed the original Texas Declaration of Independence. But Borden Jr. was also and inventive thinker. He created a horse-drawn wagon that was also a boat. More importantly he found a way to evaporate 60 percent of the water from milk, resulting in milk that didn’t go bad in the Texas heat. This was a boon for a society that didn’t yet have refrigeration. Much later sugar was added to the vacuum sealed milk and it lasts for years. I think it is still on grocery store shelves today with the name “Eagle Brand Condensed Milk.” ________ Native Texan Sc...