Summer Plans

Image above is of Palo Duro Canyon, the second largest canyon in the United States and the birthplace of the Red River. It is located near Amarillo, Texas. Hah, and you thought the Texas panhandle was flat!

This is turning out to be an exciting summer. I can’t wait to tell the very, very few people who stumble upon my site about all the planning that is going on here in Red River Historian-ville!

First, I bought a Volkswagon Jetta TDI (diesel), and I have begun putting biodiesel B100 in my tank. I now have ca. 80% less emissions than a gas car, and I also get about 40 mpg. Not too shabby! I found a great place for biodiesel in the Dallas/Fort Worth Area, http://www.dfwbiodieselinc.com . The station is located along Long Avenue next to 35 W in Fort Worth.  The Sun Travel Plaza in Denton also sells B20, and if you happen to own (or are considering purchasing) a diesel car/truck, you can find out where you can purchase biodiesel in your neck of the woods at http://e85.whipnet.net/alt.fuel/biodiesel.stations.html (this link lists Texas only, but you can snoop around and find your own state).

Summer is going to be busy, too. In June, I’ll be attending a workshop in Michigan on the history of the Ford company’s dealings with labor issues. This workshop is sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities (http://www.hfcc.edu/landmarks/). I’ve got a ton of reading to get done by the time of the workshop, which will last a week. Hmm, maybe I should be reading instead of blogging…?

I also have two, possibly three trips planned, in addition to teaching a summer class. I will be making my final Bonnie and Clyde (see: http://www.redriverhistorian.com/clydeart.html ) trip in June, where I’ll be visiting sites in Oklahoma, Missouri, Kansas, and Iowa. Then, I’m taking the annual pilgrimmage to Galveston to enjoy sun and surf at the Red Neck Riveria. Towards the end of summer, I’m hoping to take a week and a half to travel out west: I want to visit the Petrified Forest National Park (http://www.nps.gov/pefo), Grand Canyon National Park (http://www.nps.gov/grca) , the Bonnie and Clyde Death Car Exhibit at Primm Valley Casino in Nevada (http://www.vegas.com/attractions/outside_lasvegas/getawaycar.html) , Zion National Park (http://www.nps.gov/zion), Durango, Colorado (http://www.durango.org/), and Boise City, Oklahoma, where travelers and cattle drivers left their names on autograph rock along the Santa Fe Trail (http://www.nps.gov/archive/safe/fnl-sft/photos/okpages/phook.htm). I’ve planned the trip so that I can drive through Monument Valley (http://www.monumentvalley.com/), too. Man, I’m hoping that all works out schedule-wise and I’ll be able to do that.

Anyway… my books are coming along quite nicely, too. I should have them ready to go by the end of summer, hopefully.

Hope that whoever is out there (you are welcome to comment, I won’t bite!) will also have a great, safe, and not-too-hot summer!

Peace!

Additions to My Site = More to Explore!

This old plantation store between Shreveport and Natchitoches, Louisiana, is where sharecroppers, who were paid with scrip, would buy what they needed from the plantation owner.

I’ve always meant to add information on Lousiana and Arkansas to my site, but time constraints have never allowed me sufficient time to explore those areas as much as I wanted. Which is funny, because most of my family lives in eastern Texas and Louisiana.

I decided that this year, I will include Louisiana and Arkansas into the “fold” - after all, my site is called Red River Historian. And the river certainly runs through those states, too! The Red River has a real presence in Louisiana’s history, and althogh my focus has been on western history, I’ve made the committment (and it wasn’t hard to committ, anyway) to learn and discover more about southern history.

It’s strange how until recently, the history of the US South has not been a big interest of mine. I think it stems from the proliferation of histories that deal with the South. The South is arguably the most-studied region in US history, especially the antebellum and Civil War periods, and somtimes it’s hard to wrap my head around it. I’m not a big Civil War fan, so I will continue to “gloss over” the war except when necessary, but I am interested in the periods of Americanization after the Louisiana Purchase.  So this is good news… it means I have a lot more exciting things to discover!

 

Hidden Dallas

The tiled floor peaks out from underneath the asphalt of a parking lot in downtown Dallas reminds me of what has been lost.

Passenger service to St Louis from Dallas via the Texas and Pacific - now, the Amtrak takes the intrepid traveler to that destination.

I know there are many, many people out there who have a low opinion of Dallas (I’m not naming names, but you know who you are). Fortunately, I’m not one of them. I think Dallas is pretty nifty. Yes, some parts are ugly, there are WAY too many ‘iffy’ neighborhoods, and the differences between the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’ are palatable. And, besides the always insightful and slightly neurotic Dallas Observer, the city only has one newspaper. 

However… Dallas is a real card. This city tries to be fancy and cosmopolitan, but its shady little past always keeps popping up in the most unexpected places.

I took a drive through Dallas the other day to visit a bunch of sights -the Texas Theater in Oak Cliff, Old City Hall, Old Red Museum, JFK Memorial (you know, the usual Kennedy tour) and while moseying around, I spotted some very interesting hints of what Dallas used to be like.

On Elm Street, just south of the US 75 bridge, one can see an old Texas and Pacific advertisement painted on the side of a commercial building - a tribute to Deep Ellum’s railroad past, where the T&P would lumber on Pacific Avenue, the next street over. In a parking lot just a few blocks up from Deep Ellum are the remains of what once was a magnificently tiled floor of some poor, demolished building.

I’ve promised myself that very soon I’ll be taking a visit to the DeGoyler Library at SMU to hunt down some more vintage Dallas photos, just so I can see what Pacific Avenue used to look like with the trains slicing through its middle. I also like to picture the way Dallas was before that bohemoth, Interstate 30, was built and cut off the southern part of downtown (on occasion, I’ve had people gripe that Fair Park was so far away, when it’s really just a mile from Union Station!)

Oh, how I wish Dallas looked like it used to…

Driving and discovering

I took a couple of roadtrips this past weekend. My road trips are usually local - I don’t drive very far because I like to know where I am. I want to see the locations behind the history. Since I’m learning so much about the history of the Red River Valley, I guess that’s why I continue to explore that region.

My class had told me about a ghost town named Dexter in Cooke County, Texas. Dexter used to be close to Gainesville, TX in size, but it was slowly abandoned after the ferry stopped running and the railroad decided not to lay its tracks around Dexter (the topography is not really suitable for tracks, as just 15 miles south the terrain is much flatter). Ergo, Dexter is a town no longer.

I found the remains of the old downtown hidden behind trees, including a vault that stands amid the foundation of what used to be the bank. Its iron shutter doors, a form of fire saftey at the turn of the century, remain intact, though the vault itself is crumbling. In a few years’ time, the entire structure will cave in on itself (maybe with the help of a few people who desire some of the loose bricks).

Besides the vault, a church, and two cemeteries, an old store (?) school (?) is the only builidng left standing in this once busy town that hugged the Red River.

As usual, I started to contemplate the fragility of the human story in the American West. Far from being unique, ghost towns litter the landscape around here, testament to the many failures of the capitalistic experiment the West was to settlers, immigrants, and industry. Withits few ruins, Dexter symbolizes the tenuous hold that people had in this region, and the rapidity of development and progress - founded in 1873 (Post Office opening), the city of Dexter had outlived its purpose by1900.

I love to read these ruins, because I feel that when I do, I allow the story to continue.