Blue Highways: Alto, Texas

Unfolding the Map

Click on Thumbnail for MapWe're still riding with William Least Heat-Moon (LHM) through small towns in East Texas.  Not much verbiage from me about the town or the dusty Texas plains today, but a good video is provided in the post below. To see where we are in our journey, click on the thumbnail of the map at right.

Book Quote

"Alto, on Texas 21 and about an hour west of the great line, was a pure Western town: streets broad and at right angles, canopies over sidewalks, false-front stores, the commercial section a single long street rather than a cluster around a confluence of streets. And the businesses tended in one manner or another toward ranching and lumbering."

Blue Highways: Part 4, Chapter 1

Mural in Alto, Texas. Photo by wildstar84, on Flickr. Click on photo to go to host site.

Alto, Texas

I don't have much to say about Alto, Texas today.  This is probably due to a few reasons.  One is that I don't know much about Alto.  I know, Littourati, that lack of knowledge usually doesn't stop me, but in this case, I'm not feeling very creative.  Besides, my hometown was very similar - a small place devoted to lumbering with a wide main street bordered by false front buildings along a single long commercial district.

If there's one thing to say, it's that once you get past the Mississippi, or past that invisible line that demarcates East from West in the United States, pretty much most semblance of European city construction disappears.  Towns stretch out.  People are individual in their outlooks and characters and do not necessarily congregate together in a town square.  There are exceptions to this.  Cities in Texas that were founded by the Spanish or Mexicans tend to still have this type of European layout, with a central square in the middle of the town or city usually fronted by a church or cathedral.  But anything founded by Anglo settlers looks and feels different.  In those towns, the emphasis is on individuality.  One goes to town to get what one needs, not necessarily to spend a lot of time hanging around, so commercial districts are emphasized and are elongated along at least a mile of street.

So, rather than bore you with things I don't know about Alto (you can look at the links below if you want to know more about this particular place), I will post a YouTube video featuring a song, "Stupid Texas Song," that captures Texas pride while poking fun at it.  The Austin Lounge Lizards are a Texas band that's versatile in folk, country and bluegrass.  They also have a lot of fun by writing and performing songs that make fun of virtually everything.  In this case, they take on the way that Texans perceive themselves.  Think of it as a kind of good natured, gentle riposte to Lyle Lovett's "That's Right, You're Not From Texas (But Texas Wants You Anyway)" that I included in a previous post.  One thing that Texas has, in abundance, is amazing musicians who create amazing music.  I hope to introduce you to some of them as we make our way across Texas with LHM.  Enjoy the Lizards - the video includes pictures that match the lyrics!

If you want to know more about Alto

Texas State Historical Association: Alto
Texas Escapes: Alto
Wikipedia: Alto

Next up: Caddo Mounds State Historical Park, Texas

Blue Highways: Nacogdoches, Texas

Unfolding the Map

Click on Thumbnail for MapWho knew that passing through Nacogdoches, we'd be passing through some of the most intense history in Texas?  Rebellions, rebellions, rebellions.  Here's where Texas gets its reputation for fierce independence.  Click on the map thumbnail to see where Nacogdoches is located.

Book Quote

"...old Nacogdoches (not to be confused with old Natchitoches, Louisiana; Nacogdoches sounds as it looks, but Natchitoches comes out NACK-uh-tesh)."

Blue Highways: Chapter 4, Part 1

Street scene in Nacogdoches. From the SkyscraperPage forum. Photo part of "photolitherland's" photo gallery. Click on photo to go to host site.

Nacogdoches, Texas

In my last post, I wrote about Texas exceptionalism.  Exceptionalism isn't uncommon - we all feel at times that the place we live or the country we inhabit is the best place on earth, for reasons that are obvious to us.  In the case of Texas, part of that feeling comes from the fact that Texans are known for having a rebellious and independent spirit.

The Alamo in San Antonio is often singled out as being the ultimate symbol of Texan independence.  In 1836, some 200-250 Texians fought Mexican General Santa Anna's army of 4000-5000 men for 13 days before succumbing, and through their act of sacrifice manage to inflame the rest of Texas which led to the defeat of the Mexican army at the Battle of San Jacinto a few weeks later.

I would argue, if the Alamo is Exhibit 1, then Nacogdoches might be Exhibit 2.  Nacogdoches might not stir any recognition to the casual reader.  However, you've heard of the Six Flags over Texas (no, not the theme park!).  Texas as a territory has been subject to six different governments:  Spain, France, Mexico, the Republic of Texas, the United States of America, and the Confederate States of America.  But Nacogdoches claims nine different flags, and some of these flags were short-lived independent republics set up to challenge Spanish and Mexican sovereignty in the Texas before the Alamo became the ultimate Texan rebellion success story.

In 1812, a joint Mexican and American filibustering expedition of 130 men assembled in Nachitoches, Louisiana invaded Spanish Texas.  In this context, filibusters are men engaged in unauthorized military expeditions against a foreign government.  After the filibusters entered Texas, their number swelled to 300 and the expedition raised its flag over Nacogdoches and the rest of Northeast Texas, proclaiming what is now known as the Gutierrez-Magee Republic.  The small force fought winning battles twice, at Goliad and at Rosilla, and executed the Spanish governor.  However, despite a request for help to the United States government, the U.S. chose to not interfere, and the execution of the Spanish governor caused 100 Americans to quit the cause.  The rebels were defeated in a final decisive battle at Medina.

Seven years later, James Long led another rebellion of about 300 men against the Spanish and established the first Republic of Texas (also known as the Long Republic) at Nacogdoches.  Though Long established trading posts and the rebels began the first English language newspaper printed in Texas, the tiny republic lasted only one month.  Long tried to get assistance from the pirate Jean Lafitte, not realizing that Lafitte was a double agent for the Spanish.  The Spanish responded with a force of 500 men, forcing Long to withdraw back to Nachitoches, Louisiana.  He attempted to raise another expedition from Galveston, but faced difficulties when a group of 50 Americans were arrested by U.S. authorities as they tried to cross into Texas.  With a force of only 52 men, Long captured Presidio La Bahia at Goliad, but had to surrender four days later to Spanish troops.  He was taken back to Mexico City, where six months later he was killed by a guard reportedly bribed by his onetime comrade and future governor of Texas for the Mexican government, Jose Felix Trespalacios.

The first attempt by Anglo settlers to secede from Mexico was centered around the creation of the Fredonia Republic near Nacogdoches in December of 1826, led by Haden Edwards.  Edwards was an empresario, or a person granted the right to settle on Texas land in exchange for recruiting and taking responsibility for subsequent settlers.  Mexico's policy in Texas was to grant rights to settlers from the United States so that it could better control its sparsely populated regions.  Edwards was granted these rights, but appears to have misunderstood the extent of the powers granted to him.  He assumed that he could evaluate already existing land grants, demand proof of ownership, and expel those that couldn't prove their ownership so that he could then parcel the land out to people from the southern U.S.  The tension caused the Mexican government to revoke his land grant, which led to the rebellion.  Edwards gained the alliance of the Cherokee nation.  However, rather than rally other Texas settlers to his side, Edwards' actions alarmed other respected empresarios such as Stephen F. Austin (later to play a pivotal role in the Texas rebellion that gave Texas its independence).  Austin actually sent men to assist the Mexican forces in putting down the rebellion.  In January, 1827 as the Mexican forces approached Nacogdoches, Edwards fled back into the United States.  However, while short lived, the Fredonia Rebellion had lasting implications.  It fanned fears in the Mexican government that the United States was plotting to take over Texas, and thereafterward the Mexican government looked toward its Texas settlers with distrust.  Mexico began to restrict immigration from the United States into Texas, leading to settler anger.  It also made Nacogdoches instrumental in other Texian rebellions against Mexican authority right up to the Battle of the Alamo.

Overall, this spirit of independence and willingness to rebel against authority on the part of Texans, particularly Anglo settlers in Texas, has influenced a Texas worldview that seems to be part pride and part us-against-them.  I experienced it in academia in Texas, where American politics courses are required to teach Texas government courses.  Texas public schools must teach their students out of Texas government-approved textbooks - which means that textbook companies often make a general edition of their textbooks and a "Texas edition" of their textbooks. 

It can be heard in the occasional less than serious talk of secession by Texas public officials such as Governor Rick Perry.  In effect, these blusterings are merely what they are.  My liberal friends in other places respond with "let them go."  As a person who has lived in Texas, however, I know the real story.  Texas needs the United States.  It would not be able to afford the costs of being independent.  However, what my friends don't realize is the other thing I know...the United States needs Texas.  It needs Texas' natural resources, it needs its agriculture and it even needs its politicians, who for better AND worse have had significant impacts on the United States.  It is a fascinating place with a fascinating history, and is part of the fabric of our country and our story.  Texas history, since 1836, is United States history and as such, as complex and compelling as any we have to offer.

Sources:  Wikipedia, History.com, Texas State Library and Archives Commission Online, Texas A&M online

If you want to know more about Nacogdoches

Nacogdoches Convention & Visitors Bureau
Nacogdoches Daily Sentinel (newspaper)
Stephen F. Austin State University
Texas Blueberry Festival
Wikipedia: Nacogdoches

Next up: Alto, Texas

Blue Highways: Carthage and Mount Enterprise, Texas

Unfolding the Map

Click on Thumbnail for MapNow in the Lone Star State, William Least Heat-Moon (LHM) drives Ghost Dancing into a state that has many interesting facets, not the least of which is a pride as big as all of Texas.  Mount Enterprise and Carthage are right at the beginning.  Click the thumbnail of the map at right, and you'll see where they line up along the trip.

Book Quote

"The true West differs from the East in one great, pervasive, influential and awesome way: space. The vast openness changes the roads, towns, houses, farms, crops, machinery, politics, economics, and, naturally, ways of thinking. How could it do otherwise?....

"....The long horizon gave a sense of flatness, but in truth, it was only a compression through distance of broad-topped hills....

"The towns: Carthage, Mount Enterprise..."

Blue Highways: Part 4, Chapter 1

See, everything is big in Texas! Photo taken by Amy Evans Streeter somewhere near Carthage, Texas. Click on photo to go to her site.

Carthage and Mount Enterprise, Texas

The magnificence of the sky over Texas is truly startling if you've never experienced it.  It may seem that Texans overblow things when one listens to how "the stars at night are big and bright deep in the heart of Texas."  In fact, if one listens, it might seem that everything in Texas is overblown.  How can people think so much of a particular place?

The sky itself is the first indication that there may be something more to Texas.  It is not that the sky isn't brilliant and encompassing in other places.  I imagine that if you are standing in the flat farmland of North Dakota, the effect might be similar.  In these areas of Texas, the sky bends up and over one like a huge dome.  In the day, it seems to stretch on forever.  One can feel extremely lonely if one is in the middle of nowhere in Texas, or one can feel extremely connected to the universe.  It is not difficult to feel both things at the same time.  There are endless possibilities over the horizon, where more emptiness is just waiting for someone to come along and make something of it.

At night, the stars do burn bright.  How could they not in a state that has so many people, and yet so many open spaces that one can easily find places where ground light from the state's major cities does not interfere with one's enjoyment of the cosmos in its vast infiniteness?

If one takes LHM's contention that there is a boundary between the West and East in the United States, and that Texas stands on the West side of that boundary, then one will notice a change crossing into Texas.  The towns are more spread out, because they are not bound by geography or landscape.  Roads travel straight to the horizon, because they are not limited to the confining contours of an overabundance of hills.  People have the mindset that the land is a limitless resource to be exploited, not a limiting feature.  I'm not saying that all of Texas is like this - certainly the western side of Texas becomes desert and mountainous.   But for better or worse, if one sees Texas from this angle, it is easy to see, in part, why Texas has become what it is.

For better or worse, Texas exceptionalism grows out of these very features.  Many Texans are convinced that their state is different, and better.  It was built on the backs of independent and enterprising pioneers who came to the state to ranch, to grow, and later to drill and prospect.  Those who do well in Texas are those who do well for themselves.  Having lived in California and in the Midwest by the time I got to Texas, I could relate to both those who lived and breathed this ideal and those who criticized it.  After all, I grew up in a town made up of the same types of people, who felt that where they lived was exeptional.  But, also being a person who identified with those who had neither the means nor the resources to do well for themselves, I could relate to those who lamented the lack of social services and good public transportation.  Despite my misgivings (and I will admit that I moved to Texas with the conviction that I would hate it) I came to be fascinated by the state and literally shed tears when I moved away from San Antonio. 

Having lived all over the country now, I'm not sure that I can bring myself to say that Texas is better.  But I'm not a native Texan.  I still get angry especially when I hear some of the things that come out of Texas politics.  Those are feelings and beliefs, but not the essence of the state.  I gently chide my fellow liberal friends who think that Texas (along with the rest of the South) should be allowed to leave the United States. 

When I think of Texas, I think of people who in many ways are generous and kind, who have created some of the most moving music I have ever heard (see the link to the Texas Country Music Hall of Fame below), and who do live in a great state full of surprising cultural and geographical diversity.  I think of a state that encompasses one of the most wonderful places I have ever been, Big Bend National Park and Big Bend Ranch State Park.  I think of swimming with friends in the beautiful downtown retreat of Barton Springs, whose waters are maintained at a constant temperature that cools you down on a hot Texas day, or swimming with my wife in Balmorhea in a hole that draws recreational swimmers and people learning how to scuba dive.  I think of drinking a Shiner Bock made by Czech immigrants between San Antonio and Houston, in the German town of Fredericksburg and watching an African-American couple shop next to a Hispanic family not too far geographically from where the architect of the Great Society, Lyndon B. Johnson, was born and raised.

Lyle Lovett sang an anthem that manages to encompass both Texas exceptionalism and its welcoming attitude in the same breath.  The song says "that's right, you're not from Texas, but Texas wants you anyway."  When I lived there, I felt that there was a space for me.

If you want to know more about Carthage and Mount Enterprise

Carthage, Texas Official Home Page
Panola College
Panola Watchman (newspaper)
Texas Country Music Hall of Fame
Texas Escapes: Carthage
Texas Escapes: Mount Enterprise
Texas State Historical Association: Carthage
Texas State Historical Association: Mount Enterprise
Wikipedia: Carthage
Wikipedia: Mount Enterprise
Wikipedia: Texas Country Music Hall of Fame

Next up: Nacogdoches, Texas

On the Road: Dalhart, Texas

Click on Thumbnail for MapUnfolding the Map

Sal lists a number of non-descript places in this passage.  He glosses over New Mexico, though he most likely passed through Gallup and my current home of Albuquerque on Route 66.  He then mentions Dalhart as his only place-name in Texas, followed by a bunch of nameless towns in Oklahoma and Kansas.  It is 1940s America in its most mysterious, faceless immensity.  Since Sal points out Dalhart, we will too.  Click the map to join us there.

Book Quote

"In inky night we crossed New Mexico; at gray dawn it was Dalhart, Texas; in the bleak Sunday afternoon we rode through one Oklahoma flat-town after another; at nightfall it was Kansas. The bus roared on. I was going home in October. Everybody goes home in October."

On the Road, Chapter 14

Dalhart in the 1950sDalhart, Texas

From 2008-09, I lived in Lubbock, Texas.  I had accepted a position as a visiting professor of political science at Texas Tech University, and I left my wife and dog in Albuquerque, New Mexico and rented a house in Lubbock.  From there, I made the five hour drive back to Albuquerque every weekend except for the one weekend per month that my wife came to visit me.

Lubbock is about 3½ hours drive from Dalhart, which lies situated at the northern end of the Texas Panhandle.  Both are roughly similar in elevation.  Lubbock is much larger, with about 200,000 people and a very large university (about 40,000 students) compared to under 10,000 people for Dalhart, but both are very much agricultural towns.

In that part of Texas, the immensity of the state really impresses itself upon one.  One may drive for hours through the Llano Estacado passing through small towns such as Shallowater, Anton, Littlefield, Sudan, Muleshoe, and Farwell that retreat indoors around their grain elevators around 7:00 p.m.  Texas high school football crackles through the radio on practically every station on Friday nights, as portrayed in Friday Night Lights.  I think that Texas high school football would take precedence over a nuclear attack.  "Well, they got Washington, New York, L.A. and Houston, but hey, Muleshoe is up by 10 over Levelland with 6:05 to go in the 4th quarter, and since they just nuked Dallas, we can make a real run for state champs!"

Of course, part of the mystique of Texas was encapsulated in the 1980s television show, Dallas.  This show was partly set on the fictional Southfork Ranch.  The historic XIT Ranch in Dalhart fully connects this region with its cattle ranching past and present.  At one time, the XIT was the largest ranch in the United States with nearly 3 million acres under fence - that's bigger than many U.S. states.

The amazing thing about West Texas, however, is how its music has stamped itself on the American scene.  Some of the most incredible musicians have come out of West Texas and the Panhandle.  Bob Wills, Joe Ely, Lloyd Maines, Butch Hancock, Terry Allen, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Waylon Jennings, Guy Clark, Mac Davis, Buddy Holly, Roy Orbison, and Buddy Knox, among others, were raised and first formed their musical careers in under the vast open skies of West Texas.  When in Lubbock, I was privileged with my wife to see Joe Ely perform with flamenco guitarist Teye.  It was a fantastic show.  Ely told the story of how he performed a show early in his career in a town outside of Lubbock, and the Baptist preachers the next day preached fire and brimstone against his music from the pulpit, calling it depraved and the devil's music.  He figured his career was through, only to discover that people were lining up to get in to the next show!

While I am happy to be back with my wife in Albuquerque, my stint living in West Texas reinforced to me that you can't always judge a book by its cover.  West Texas, at least musically, is vibrant and alive and this creativity is nourished under Texas' wide, dusty skies.  Maybe as he drives through Dalhart in the "gray dawn," Sal sees Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys loading their gear into a bus in front of a honkytonk outside of town.  It's too bad he missed that show.  He might have found something beat in the jazz and blues influenced Western swing.

Here is a song by James McMurtry, 60 Acres, that speaks of West Texas.  Enjoy!

If you want to know more about Dalhart

Dalhart Chamber of Commerce
The Dalhart Texan (Newspaper)
The Handbook of Texas Online: Dalhart
Wikipedia: Dalhart
Wikipedia: XIT Ranch
XIT Ranch Museum

Next up: St. Louis, Missouri