The Man and His Words

This book arrived in my mailbox today . . .

George Sessions Perry
The Man and His Words
by
Garna L. Christian

Looking forward to reading it . . .

Cedar Berries

These arrived in my mailbox today . . .

Cedar Berries
by
Dorothy Lee Hansen

and I quote . . .

The rolling hills of Texas
keep pulling on my heart,
reminding me of childhood days
and loved ones on the farm. . . .

There's the sky like nowhere else,
big and blue and wide,
always full of cumulus clouds.
I'll love it 'till I die.

Special thanks go to
Judith Richards Shubert
for last November's introduction

The year is 1879

This is my hometown . . . Rockdale, Milam County, Texas . . . at five years of age . . . and as shown on pages 230 and 231 in The Texans . . . which is a part of The Old West series of books published by Time-Life Books . . . the caption on this photo says . . .

Cotton bales ready to be weighed on scales (extreme right) lie along the main street of the town of Rockdale, northeast of Austin. The year is 1879, and similar towns were springing up to the west as railroads spread across the plains, opening the hinterland to Texas farmers and ranchers.

God Bless the USA

If tomorrow all the things were gone I’d worked for all my life,
And I had to start again with just my children and my wife.
I’d thank my lucky stars to be living here today,
‘Cause the flag still stands for freedom and they can’t take that away.

And I’m proud to be an American where at least I know I’m free.
And I won’t forget the men who died, who gave that right to me.
And I’d gladly stand up next to you and defend her still today.
‘Cause there ain’t no doubt I love this land God bless the U.S.A.

From the lakes of Minnesota, to the hills of Tennessee,
across the plains of Texas, from sea to shining sea,
From Detroit down to Houston and New York to LA,
Well, there’s pride in every American heart, and it’s time to stand and say:

I’m proud to be an American where at least I know I’m free.
And I won’t forget the men who died, who gave that right to me.
And I’d gladly stand up next to you and defend her still today.
‘Cause there ain’t no doubt I love this land God bless the U.S.A.

Lee Greenwood

Oliver Spain ca. 1959

Upper Right
George Oliver Spain, III
1951 ~ 2008
from the pages of
The 1959 Lair
(Rockdale Yearbook)
Oliver's findagrave memorial page

Rockdale, My Home Town

Texas
A World in Itself
by
George Sessions Perry
Copyright 1942

170 Years of Cemetery Records

More new books . . .
this is the county where I grew up . . .
and where the kith 'n kin have been since before 1850 . . .
published in 2001 . . .
by Norinne Holder Holman . . .

Happy Birthday, Miss Ruby

A HISTORY
OF
LEE COUNTY
TEXAS
VOL. II

THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED
BY
LEE COUNTY HISTORICAL COMMISSION
TO

MRS. RUBY NETTLES VANCE
LIFE LONG RESIDENT OF LEXINGTON
A MEMBER OF THE COMMISSION SINCE 1965

Her deep love for preserving history has been her motivation for many years to research and chronicle the histories of Lee County families and events and to share this knowledge through the pages of Lee County publications.

She was instrumental in gathering information for Volume I of the History of Lee County and she has been one of the driving forces in insisting that this continuation of the History be completed.

Researchers will be eternally thankful to Mrs. Vance and to her fellow historian, Mrs. Jan Conn, for their diligent work in compiling a record of every cemetery in Lee County -- listing the wording on many of the grave stones and the location of each grave in all of these cemeteries.

Thank you, Miss Ruby
01 April 1910 ~ 14 April 2003

Happy Birthday, Robert Frost

This photo . . . highlighting one of the poems by my distant cousin, Robert Frost (1874~1963) . . . shows pages 194 and 195 in one of my books, The Little Big Book of America . . . notice the shadow image of the chain holding up my swing . . . to represent my link to the writer of this poem . . . who was born on this date in the year 1874 . . .

The Cradle of Texas

This is a photo of a page in The Cradle of Texas, A Pictorial History of San Augustine County . . . by Charla Jones . . . published in April of 1997 . . . I picked up my copy at Half-Price Books . . .

On this date . . . the 22nd day of March . . . in the year 1838 . . . Mahala Lee Roberts marries John M. Sharp in San Augustine County, Texas . . . Mahala and John are my 3rd great-grandparents . . .

We don't yet know what happened to John M. Sharp . . . by the time of the 1850 census, John is nowhere to be found . . . and Mahala and their two children are enumerated next door to Matthew Cartwright . . . who at that time was living in the house in this photo . . .

Sad News from the Alamo

On the 6th of March about midnight . . .

This photo shows a page from one of my most-used Texas history books . . . Texas Extra - A Newspaper History of the Lone Star State 1835-1935 . . . from the collection of Eric C. Caren . . . it apparently took until the 12th of April in the year 1836 for the news of the fall of the Alamo . . . on the 6th of March . . . to hit the pages of these New York newspapers . . .

Texas History

Happy Birthday, Longfellow

Silently, one by one,
In the infinite meadows of Heaven,
Blossom the lovely stars,
The forget-me-nots of the angels.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
27 February 1807 - 24 March 1882

Happy Birthday, Aunt Gladys

On the 21st day of February . . . in the year 1913 . . . Gladys Coreen Muston was born in Lee County, Texas . . . one of her five older sisters was my paternal grandma . . . this photograph shows a vintage image of Aunt Gladys from Grandma's photo album . . . I placed it on the February 1913 page in my old perpetual calendar book . . . Aunt Gladys is on your left . . . the girl on the right is probably their youngest sister, Pauline . . .

Texas Statehood Day

The Supreme Court of the United States has ruled that Dec. 29, 1845, was the date Texas was admitted [to the United States]. It was on this date that the newly written State Constitution was accepted by Congress of the United States. However, it was not until Feb. 16, 1846, that the first State Legislature convened at the call of President Anson Jones who yielded to Governor J. Pinckney Henderson. Three days later, on Feb. 19, the formalities of transition from nationhood to statehood were observed with the lowering of the Lone Star Flag of the Republic of Texas and the raising of the Stars and Stripes. This day, Feb. 19, was declared to be Texas Statehood Day by resolution of the Forty-Seventh Legislature in 1941.

The resolution adopted by the Forty-Seventh Legislature designated Centennial of Statehood years to be 1945 and 1946 and proclaimed that the historical events of that period should be appropriately commemorated with all sections of Texas participating. The momentous developments within the economic and social structure of the state during the last few years will leave Texas and Texans facing a situation with good and bad potentialities, as the war closes. The year, 1946, might easily be the opening of a new century in more than the passing of the century milepost.

The development of plans for Statehood observances will, of course, depend largely upon the progress of Allied military and naval effort during 1943-1945. Co-operation in the war and postwar effort has been and will be a major activity of the Statehood Commission.

From the 1943-1944 Texas Almanac published by the Dallas Morning News.