Texas History: Come and learn it

In 1835, Texans stridently refused to give up a small bronze cannon to the Mexican forces directed to take away it, marking the primary engagement within the Texas Revolution. On the Battle of Gonzales, the small group of Texans defiantly raised a flag with a black star and the picture of the cannon together with the well-known expression: “Come and take it.” The volunteers then turned again the Mexicans.

I recall being reproached by Mrs. Fulkerson in my seventh grade Texas historical past class for noting to my classmates that the act of flying the flag appeared extra foolish than daring, because the Mexican troopers seemingly spoke Spanish and couldn’t learn the patriotic phrases. It was my first lesson that Texas historical past is not any joking matter. I cherished my seventh grade Texas historical past class, maybe greater than another I ever took, and, unknowingly, it put me on a profession path. It was an ideal privilege to function a college member on the College of Texas at Tyler the place I used to be capable of be the Texas historian. Different states do not need state historians. Nor have they got the wealthy tapestry that’s Texas historical past.

Texans have an obligation and expectation to grasp what Texas is and why we’re the best way we’re. As John Steinbeck famous, “For all its monumental vary of house, local weather, and bodily look, and for all the interior squabbles, contentions, and strivings, Texas has a decent cohesiveness maybe stronger than another part of America. Wealthy, poor, Panhandle, Gulf, metropolis, nation, Texas is the obsession, the correct examine, and the passionate possession of all Texans.”

By 2050, the Texas inhabitants may prime 40 million, making the state the biggest within the nation, in keeping with one estimate from the Texas Demographic Heart. Lots of these immigrants will make the state their everlasting residence. Hopefully, they may even make Texas historical past a precedence as a result of failure to keep up that particular character can show expensive. In an effort to maintain these newcomers from dousing the flames of the Texas miracle, they should perceive how Texas got here into being and why it’s the place they now need to dwell, conduct enterprise and lift their households.

Texas shares a definite path within the American story as a result of, partly, it’s one in every of tragedy. Texas’ shared id was cast within the ashes of defeats from the battle of the Alamo and the bloodbath at Goliad. Settlers from the USA and Texas natives, Texians and Tejanos alike, and immigrants fashioned an imperfect republic. Residents of the Republic of Texas had totally different religions, cultures and backgrounds. What that they had in frequent was that that they had suffered loss. Not till Pearl Harbor did People perceive the sting of defeat and the distinct unifying affect that it could possibly have. “Keep in mind the Alamo” and “Keep in mind Goliad” are rallying cries that each Texan ought to know and really feel as one in every of indomitable battle that not solely outlined the Texas Revolution, but in addition the republic and the rest of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

The 87th Texas Legislature was so involved about growing “consciousness of Texas values” that it handed Home Invoice 2497, creating The 1836 Mission, a copycat counterbalance to the 1619 Mission, one other model of historical past deeply knowledgeable by loss. The 1836 Mission committee lately revealed its findings, together with a pamphlet on Texas historical past to be supplied to anybody receiving a driver’s license. The group instructed making social research schooling emphasised throughout the state the identical manner that STEAM topics are, that the TEA develop an educational program for everybody educating Texas historical past, and that March 2 be a state vacation in celebration of Texas Independence.

One small college that payments itself as “uniquely Texan,” Schreiner College within the Texas Hill Nation city of Kerrville, was targeted on the distinctiveness of Texas previous to the Legislature’s motion, forming its Texas Heart in 2020. The middle’s director, Don Frazier, remarked, “The individuals transferring right here haven’t any actual foundation for understanding the Texas secret sauce aside from it really works for them financially.” He believes, “The Texas Heart helps natives and newcomers alike discover their place on this Texas story, to create social capital, to assist describe the genius loci of this place we name residence and function an sincere dealer on a few of the troublesome conversations happening throughout the state.”

Frazier presently is conducting a free on-line Texas historical past quiz and the Texas Heart will publish the outcomes. Presently, the typical grade is a low C, maybe adequate for Frazier, who quipped, “C’s get levels.”

Texas has all the time been a spot the place cultures collided. All of us want to grasp why Texas is the best way it’s and the way the individuals have made it such. Failing to know and embrace one’s historical past has grave penalties, so I provide a cautionary story in closing.

Within the 1850s, a brand new wave of “Gone to Texas” occurred following Texas annexation by the USA. Southern immigrants swarmed into the state, bringing with them a harmful and poisonous mix of regional nationalism and “fire-eating” politics. Few Texans right this moment understand Sam Houston was defeated by one in every of these fire-eaters, Hardin Runnels, a Mississippian, within the gubernatorial election of 1857. The rise of this Southern faction, led by Runnels on the state stage and Texas Sen. Louis Wigfall on the nationwide stage, eschewed the values of the Texas Revolution and the republic interval and introduced Texas into the Confederacy. Texas ought to have adopted the course of Houston and charted a novel course from the Southern states as it will do within the twentieth century.

Realizing our previous, each good and unhealthy, ought to assist us all chart one of the best course for Texas because it turns into the nation’s largest state and produces extra larger-than-life figures. There’s loads of room for extra Barbara Jordans, Juan Seguins, and Tris Audio system, and natives and newcomers alike would possibly get pleasure from studying about them.

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