Texas History: Main Themes
Size of Texas
268,820 mi² (696,241 km²)
Blackouts in WWII
A blackout during war, or in preparation for an expected war, is the practice of collectively minimizing outdoor light, including upwardly directed (or reflected) light. This was done in the 20th century to prevent crews of enemy aircraft from being able to navigate to their targets simply by sight, for example during the London Blitz of 1940. In coastal regions, a shore-side blackout of city lights would also help protect ships from being seen in silhouette against the shore and attacked by enemy submarines farther out at sea hidden from view.
Texas mineral resources
oil, clay, copper, iron, limestone, sand and gravel, stone, sulfur, uranium, etc
Mexico's independence from Spain
Near the close of the 18th century, the people of New Spain began to rebel against their government. The Creoles (Spaniards born in the new world) resented the Spanish control of high offices and monopolies. They also disliked the political and economic reforms initiated by Spain to modernize the colony. Moreover, the Creoles wanted to be the custodians of the Spanish monarchy during the French takeover of Spain and were against the oppression of the Indian population. They were also alarmed by the liberal ideas coming from the United States and France.
alphabet agencies
New Deal agencies were the U.S. federal government agencies created as part of the New Deal of President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
NAFTA
North American Free Trade Agreement
Runaway Scrape
The Runaway Scrape is the period in early 1836 generally beginning with the Siege and Fall of the Alamo and ending with the Battle of San Jacinto on April 21. It was a period of terror and panic among the settlements of Texas, as Santa Anna and the Mexican armies swept eastward from San Antonio, virtually unopposed.
Homestead Act
The Texas Congress passed this in 1839. This law protected a family's home, tools, and 50 acres of land from seizure for nonpayment of debts.
Boundaries of Texas
The traditional boundary between Texas and Mexico: Nueces River
Rio Grande
a river in North America, also forms the the US-Mexico border from El Paso to the gulf
Blackland Praire
this region includes more of the state's larger cities and towns than the others, excellent transportation systems most of Texas's manufacturing takes place here, fertile soil
Turtle Bay Resolutions
Adopted on June 13, 1832. The colonists declared their loyalty to Mexico. They denied that they were rebelling against Mexican authority. They insisted that they were supporting Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna.
Cold War
" War of words and threats" between the US and USSR from 1945-1990. It was a political and economic stuggle between these nations.
WWII (Allies and Axis Powers)
(1939-1945) Axis powers (Germany, Italy, Japan, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria) versus Allies (U.S., Britain, France, USSR, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Denmark, Greece, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, South Africa, Yugoslavia)
European Explorers
(For a narrative of this period, click here.) Spanish explorer Alonso Alvarez de Pineda maps the Texas coastline. Alvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca and crew are shipwrecked near Galveston and begin exploration.
Red River Campaign
An army of some 3,000 troops moved in on the camps from five different directions. The first battle is this. It was fought in late August 1874. The army did not halt its determined search for Native American camps until the following spring.
Women's Rights
As the state became more urbanized after 1900, the economy drew growing numbers of women into the marketplace. By taking jobs, entering the professions, and operating their own companies, women brought unprecedented legal questions to business, industry, politics, and government that required lawmakers to consider the needs of women as individuals and not merely as members of families. Before Texas women gained equal rights, marriage was the most significant influence on their legal status. From the time of the early republic, a single woman (feme sole) enjoyed basic civil liberties. Although she could not vote or serve on juries, she had the right to make contracts, to sue and be sued, to choose her domicile, to own and control property, and, if widowed, to have custody of her children.
1st capital of Texas
Columbia
"Lexington of Texas"
Gonzales is most famous as the "Lexington of Texas" because it was the site of the first skirmish of the Texas Revolution. In 1831, the Mexican government had granted Green DeWitt's request for a small cannon for protection against Indian attacks. At the outbreak of disputes between the Anglo settlers and the Mexican authorities in 1835, a contingent of more than 100 Mexican soldiers was sent from San Antonio to retrieve the cannon.
Pearl Harbor
Hawaiian naval base that was boobed by the Japanese at the start of WWII.
Adams-Onis Treaty
In 1819, the United States and Spain signed this, settling the boundary dispute. Spain transferred Florida to the United States and agreed to the Sabine River as the eastern boundary of Texas. In return, the United States surrendered all claims to Texas. The Neutral Ground was now in U.S. territory.
Texas Annexation
In 1845, the Republic of Texas voluntarily asked to become a part of the United States, and the government of the United States agreed to annex the nation. Mexican leaders had long warned the United States that if it tried to make Texas a state, it would declare war.
Different Native Americans groups
Kiowas, Kiowa, Comanches, Cherokees, Wichitas, Alabama, Caddos, Coushatta, Tonkawas, Atakapans, Karankawas, Coahuiltecans, Kickapoos, Lipan Apaches, Mescalero Apaches, and Tiguas
The Alamo and its Battles
On February 23, 1836, the arrival of General Antonio López de Santa Anna's army outside San Antonio nearly caught them by surprise. Undaunted, the Texians and Tejanos prepared to defend the Alamo together. The defenders held out for 13 days against Santa Anna's army. William B. Travis, the commander of the Alamo sent forth couriers carrying pleas for help to communities in Texas. On the eighth day of the siege, a band of 32 volunteers from Gonzales arrived, bringing the number of defenders to nearly two hundred. Legend holds that with the possibility of additional help fading, Colonel Travis drew a line on the ground and asked any man willing to stay and fight to step over — all except one did. As the defenders saw it, the Alamo was the key to the defense of Texas, and they were ready to give their lives rather than surrender their position to General Santa Anna. Among the Alamo's garrison were Jim Bowie, renowned knife fighter, and David Crockett, famed frontiersman and former congressman from Tennessee. The final assault came before daybreak on the morning of March 6, 1836, as columns of Mexican soldiers emerged from the predawn darkness and headed for the Alamo's walls. Cannon and small arms fire from inside the Alamo beat back several attacks. Regrouping, the Mexicans scaled the walls and rushed into the compound. Once inside, they turned a captured cannon on the Long Barrack and church, blasting open the barricaded doors. The desperate struggle continued until the defenders were overwhelmed. By sunrise, the battle had ended and Santa Anna entered the Alamo compound to survey the scene of his victory. While the facts surrounding the siege of the Alamo continue to be debated, there is no doubt about what the battle has come to symbolize. People worldwide continue to remember the Alamo as a heroic struggle against impossible odds — a place where men made the ultimate sacrifice for freedom. For this reason, the Alamo remains hallowed ground and the Shrine of Texas Liberty.
Texas Constitution
Our laws of how the states are run.
Conscription Act of 1862
Passed on April 16, 1862. Conscription-the forced enrollment of people into military service. This required all men between the ages of 18 and 35 to serve in the armed forces of the Confederacy.
Texas independence and date to celebrate
Remembering how badly the Texans had been defeated at the Alamo, on April 21, 1836, Houston's army won a quick battle against the Mexican forces at San Jacinto and gained independence for Texas. Soon after, Houston was elected president of the Republic of Texas. The document signed by 59 people, settlers in Mexican Texas officially broke from Mexico creating the Republic of Texas. March 2, 1836
Rivers in Texas (largest)
Rio Grande (1,896 miles), Red River of the South (1,360 miles), Pecos (926 miles), Canadian (906 miles), Colorado (862 miles), Brazos (840 miles), Trinity (708 miles).
Palo Duro Canyon Battle
September 28, 1874. The most decisive battle of the Red River Campaign.
Spindletop
Spindletop is a salt dome oil field located in the southern portion of Beaumont, Texas in the United States. The Spindletop dome was derived from the Louann Salt evaporite layer of the Jurassic geologic period.
Mexican American cultures
Texas without Mexicans would not be Texas. This ethnic group, called Mexican-American, Chicano, Latino, Spanish, Tejano or Hispanic, depending on the political correctness of the time, is so essential to defining Texas culture that sometimes it is impossible to separate "Tex-Mex."
Dust Bowl
The Dust Bowl was the name given to the Great Plains region devastated by drought in 1930s depression-ridden America. The 150,000-square-mile area, encompassing the Oklahoma and Texas panhandles and neighboring sections of Kansas, Colorado, and New Mexico, has little rainfall, light soil, and high winds, a potentially destructive combination. When drought struck from 1934 to 1937, the soil lacked the stronger root system of grass as an anchor, so the winds easily picked up the loose topsoil and swirled it into dense dust clouds, called "black blizzards." Recurrent dust storms wreaked havoc, choking cattle and pasture lands and driving 60 percent of the population from the region. Most of these "exodusters" went to agricultural areas first and then to cities, especially in the Far West.
Guadalupe Peak
The highest point in the state, rises 8,749 feet (2,667 m) above sea level and is part of the Guadalupe Mountains National Park in Culberson County
Old Three Hundred
The name Old Three Hundred is sometimes used to refer to the settlers who received land grants in Stephen F. Austin's first colony. In January 1821 Austin's father, Moses Austin, had received a permit from the Spanish to settle 300 families in Texas, but he died in Missouri a short time later before he could realize his plans. Stephen F. Austin took his father's place.
Edwards Aquifer
This gets water from rain that falls on the Hill Country to the north and west.
GI Bill of Rights
a law passed in 1944 to help returning servicemen. Paid veterans to attend college.
Gulf of Mexico
a major water resource of texas, commercial and sports fishing boats ply its waters, provides jobs to thousands of Texans who work in the fishing, oil, tourist, and shipping industries, warm airs come from here, hurricanes form here, provides coastal plains with mild climate, the north central plains have colder in winter and hotter in summer because of it, Native Americans lived here
Checks and Balances System
a system to limit the power of each branch
Land Grant Law 1876
authorized 16 sections of land to be granted to a railroad company for every mile of track that it laid.
Cash crops of Texas
cotton, hay, sorghum, corn, wheat, peanuts, rice, soybeans, pecans
Types of Elections in Texas
general election, primary elections
Branches of government and their duties
judicial-interprets the laws, executive-Governor, Lieutenant Governor, Comptroller of Public Accounts, Land Commissioner, Attorney General, Agriculture Commissioner, the three-member Texas Railroad Commission, the State Board of Education, and the Secretary of State, this branch is responsible for implementing and executing laws passed by the legislative branch of government, legislative-made up of the two houses of Congress—the Senate and the House of Representatives. The most important duty of the legislative branch is to make laws. Laws are written, discussed and voted on in Congress.
Civil Rights Act of 1964
prohibited racial discrimination in education and employment. outlawed all racial segregation in public places and most private businesses
Brown v. the Board of Education
separate but equal was unconstitutional
Women in WWII
worked in factories and industries making war materials, post war- worked in the homes and many did not have jobs, if they did have jobs then they were paid less then men