Dac Crossley's Western Blog

Texas Sunflowers

From the depths of December, here’s a cheery note about sunflowers.

Sunflowers are true American natives, and have been cultivated here for centuries. They’ve been called “camp followers,” because they track our endeavors, springing up freely in disturbed places along our roadsides and ditches.

The sunflower is the state flower of Kansas. So, how did Sam Houston come to have his name associated with them?

General Sam Houston, the hero of San Jacinto and the first Governor of the Republic of Texas, established his capitol in the city he named for himself – Houston. He was angered when his political enemy, Mirabeau B. Lamar, succeeded him as Governor and moved the capitol upriver to the new city of Austin.

When Sam Houston was re-elected to succeed Lamar, he promptly attempted to move the capitol back to Houston city again. Citizens of Austin rallied, pursued Sam’s wagons and recaptured the state archives. Nevertheless, Houston governed from his namesake city. The seat of government effectively resided with him.

As a result, the city of Austin went into decline. Pedestrian traffic slowed along the river trace, so much so that a thick growth of sunflowers began to choke the up-river roads leading to Austin. In the summer of 1843, travelers found that new roads had become established, roads that ran right beside the old clogged ones.

Those abandoned roads, crammed with profusions of sunflowers, were called “Sam Houstons.” A flowery salute to the General.

(From Hollon and Butler, eds., William Bollaert’s Texas. A witty, perceptive Englishman’s observations on the infant Republic of Texas. Univ. Okla. Press, 1956)

Christmas in Kingsville

South Texas in 1934 or thereabouts, Christmas time, and decorating the house.

Electricity arrived in Kingsville after many of the houses were constructed. Those oil lamps, pink ornamental shades, still sat on the parlor table and my grandmother preferred their soft light. Those friendly shadows linger across my remembrance.

Electric current came through greenish-yellow, fabric-covered wires, twisted pairs, marching up the wall and across the ceiling, supported by a series of white porcelain insulators. Each room was illuminated by a single bulb, suspended by it yellow-green wire, switched on by a pull chain. Everything electric was added as an afterthought.

We had lights on the Christmas tree, a spruce imported from God knows where. Strings of rather large bulbs in sockets connected by more yellowish-green twisted-pair electric cord. We arranged strands of decorations, ornaments, icicles of tinsel. The large light bulbs were arranged by Mother so that colors made harmonious patterns. Breathtaking to me as a child.

No lighted spectaculars outdoors on the lawns of Kingsville. Dad drove us up and down the streets at night, one at a time. You could see Christmas trees in front rooms of most houses, trees placed near windows where they would be visible from the outdoors. And occasionally, a wreath in a window, illuminated by a single electric candle. A quiet time, a peaceful sense across your soul.

I would gladly trade our garish lighted extravagandas of today for that soft serenity of Kingsville, South Texas, in 1934.

A Princess of Mars

A Princess of Mars?

No need to get up early in the morning for this one (although Venus is still worth the effort at six a.m.).

Mars is at opposition, as bright as you’ll ever see it. It’s in the constellation Gemini, moving towards Taurus. Easy to find, it’s the brightest, reddest star up there. Look for it around nine (No, it’s not a big as the moon, despite talk-radio’s report).

Which brings to mind the western writer, Edgar Rice Burroughs. Western writer? Yes, his hero John Carter was a westerner. Do you remember A Princess of Mars, the first of Burroughs’s Mars stories? Or The Gods of Mars or The Warlord of Mars? In which John Carter escaped savage Indians by being transported (magically) to the planet Mars.

Look long and deep at the Red Planet. Raise your arms, close your eyes, and – it might happen to you!

A Visit From Saint Nicholas

Where were you – and how old were you– when someone first read to you “A Visit From Saint Nicholas?” Can you remember? That bit of verse became popular almost instantly, and its authorship is still contentious. But never mind that.

I recall my mother explaining how the name “Saint Nicholas” morphed into “Santa Claus.” I didn’t care how he got his name. He was Santa Claus. Not Santa. Always both names, like “Mickey Mouse.”

My grandmother read the poem to me, carefully as she always did, from “Poems Every Child Should Know,” while I sat in her lap. I was puzzled by the lines:

As dry leaves before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky;

I didn’t understand why you would talk about wind and leaves – let’s get on with Santa Claus!

Who read the poem to you?

‘Twas the night before Christmas,
And all through the house …”

A Sense Of Place

Our group of writers, the White Car Gang, took a day trip to Eatonton, Georgia, to view homesites and museums of famous writers. This pleasant little city (or surrounding counties) has produced at least three well-known authors – Flannery O’Conner, Joel Chandler Harris, and Alice Walker.

Although the three share a common geographic area, their circumstances were all different, and their fiction has little in common (Alice Walker famously objected to the Uncle Remus stories of Joel Chandler Harris). And it makes me wonder about a sense of place. What made a “sense of place” for each of them?

Some of our famous authors preferred to write in cafés, or other such places where they were known and were surrounded by friends and lively conversation . Flannery O’Conner preferred her dairy farm (which could not have been quiet. She had a menagerie of 50 peafowl). Louis L’Amour said he could write in the middle of a busy intersection.

And it may be most difficult to write fiction while at home, surrounded by a myriad of chores undone.

I think a sense of place must be that quiet core that you can reach into, the memory – not of events – but of the gentle touch of sun and wind and rain, the awareness of the intangibles of a summer morning, the subtle flow of love.

What do you think?

The Stars At Night

AREN'T so big and bright, in the eastern cities. Not like in Texas, where they’re always up there, guiding and amusing us. Right now, morning skies are clear in Georgia, and at the edge of town I can see old favorites in the heavens.

Who taught you the stars? Your parents? Grandparents? The Boy Scouts? All of the above?

My grandmother Baird’s house (Johnson st in Kingsville) had a good view of the northern sky, and she taught me the constellations around Polaris. Remember Cassiopeia, the ‘broken back chair?’ Grandmother Crossley ( on E. Lott) liked the southern constellations – Scorpio, the ‘teapot.’ Those constellations were swept by the 'tower light.' Remember that, KHS grads?

I slept out on the porch, our house on West Kennedy, with a full view of the glorious southern sky. That’s were I saw my first comet (in 1938). I lay in bed and watched it every night, till it disappeared.

Do children still follow the starry messengers of the seasons? Right now, to they look for the square of Pegasus, the Seven Sisters, and the mighty hunter Orion facing Taurus the bull, followed by his faithful dog?

Or, have we all become urban, where the night sky is a blank of diffused light? With no wonder about it. Living here in the East, I always pause on a rare clear night (or morning), and re-acquaint myself with those stars. And re-connect with my childhood in Texas.

Will you join me tomorrow morning, before sunrise, and salute Venus, star of the morning?

Guns For Christmas?

I’m talking about Guns Across the Rio, my epic novel. Books make excellent Christmas presents. Most of us still read, despite all the distractions offered by our computers and the omniscient TV. Consider Guns for the men in your family – husbands, brothers, sons, grandsons. And don’t forget the cowgirls. We (the Southern Scribes) sold books in the farmer’s market at Washington, Georgia, this morning. Women were good customers; it wasn’t only men buying my western.

Guns Across the Rio is available on Amazon.com, of course, but also directly from me. Send me a request by e-mail and I’ll mail you the book, postpaid, for fourteen dollars. What a deal. Even better – two copies for twenty-five dollars.

E-mail: soilmite@earthlink.net
Phone: 706-543-0639
Send money to: P. O. Box 903, Athens, Georgia, 30603-0903.

And Merry Christmas to all!

A Crossley Christmas

We’ve all had them – Those strange, unforeseen experiences that mark a special Christmas. And leave us with memories that become little icons of the magic of the Season.

The year I took Dot, her mother and my father to Jekyll Island, off the Georgia coast. The children had made all their own arrangements – it seemed like a good idea to get the old folks away, out of town.

Jekyll island was peaceful, little things to see and do, all seemed to be enjoying it. Until Christmas day, when all the restaurants were closed …

We finally found a scruffy looking place, not promising, but Mother was hungry so we went it. They began serving plates of food to us, before we tried to order. What’s happening?

“We’re feeding you indigent people for Christmas,” said the server.

Of course we weren’t indigent, but by then Mother had begun to dig in, and pronounced it good. Okay, let’s eat.

And then – and then – the TV cameras came in! Everybody ducked but me.

I was on the six and eleven o’clock TV news from Brunswick, Georgia. Indigent man receiving a Christmas meal!

Now, that’s a Crossley Christmas.

So, what about your special Christmas?

He cashed in his chips.

He cashed in his chips. That was the old euphemism, as was ‘He went west.’ Or ‘Bought the farm.’ We old timers have lost many dear friends, but never become inured to the passing of those whose lives we shared. It helps me to remember them as youngsters, laughing around the bridge table or running trot-lines in Baffin Bay. When the world was simpler and we were immortal.

Daughter Mary and her hubby Bud recently lost a friend of long standing, their canine companion Agassiz. They took him to the house in the woods for a final romp. And at last, interred him among the trees he enjoyed. Our pets give us the devotion of young children; their dependence infuses our characters. We remember them, too, in happier times.

Humans are denied that simple funeral service, and I wish they weren’t. Better to scatter the ashes in a personal service that honors, and builds a final memory, rather than the funeral parlor and its attendant, often bizarre rituals.

We should have learned better.