It is a well-known fact.....

      I was going to tell you what I believe is a well-known fact when I realized that particular fact may not be so well known.  It may not even be a fact.  It may only be a figment of my imagination which I assumed was fact, or it may be a mistaken belief of mine that I have accepted as fact.  Some people may believe it and some may know it for a fact, but many others will doubt it, and look askance at me when I state it as a well-known fact.

     I like to read history, any history, but especially Texas history.  If you think history is a collection of facts, I have news for you.  History is a collection of stories.  Some are true, some are partially true, some are based on fact, and a lot are simply the product of a historian’s imagination, based solely on how the historian would like it to have been.

     Some of these “historians” have a viewpoint, an agenda, which they can’t keep out of their writings.  Their stories are constructed to conceal parts of history that they’d rather not talk about.  A good example of this is the treatment of American Indians in our history books.  My history books led me to believe that the U.S. Government treated the Indians humanely, like missionaries dealing with orphan children. 

      I hesitate to use the word “fact” here, but there is documented proof our government lied, stole, cheated, starved, separated, killed and otherwise decimated the tribes who occupied this country because we wanted their land.  This treatment began with the purchase of Manhattan Island for $24.00 worth of beads and systematically worked its way west as the country was settled.  Treaties were broken almost as soon as they were signed and were always broken first by the white man.

     Another crop of “historians” tell the same story from the Indian’s point of view.   According to these folks, the brave, noble Indians were tip-toeing through the tulips, peacefully smelling the roses and hunting buffalo with bows and arrows when the mean old U.S. Calvary came along and attacked with Gatling Guns.  Untold numbers of innocent, simple, child like beings were victims of officially sanctioned genocide, mainly because they were in the way, but also because they were of a different color and culture.  It was easier, and cheaper, to put the Indians on a reservation and starve them to death than it was to spend the time and effort to educate and assimilate them into our society.

     Did we, as a nation, with malice aforethought, set about to eradicate or enslave the native people on this continent?  Absolutely, and so did Spain in Central and South America, France in Indo-China, the Soviet Union inside its own borders, and England in an empire where the sun never set.  Are these well known facts?  Perhaps, but they were not stressed in my history books.

      Were the Comanche sweet, innocent red men, living in teepees on the High Plains, following the buffalo and minding their own business? Absolutely not.  Reams of documents plainly show the Comanche were the meanest sum-bitches in the valley, no matter which valley we choose.  All by themselves, they kept the white man out of the high plains for over four hundred years.  Their culture was such that all their captives suffered unspeakable torture and without fail, every female captive was raped.  Are these well-known facts?  I don’t remember them from my history classes.

     Enough of history—I intended to do a piece about outstanding women in Texas.   I have already done something on Emily Morgan and the two Electra Waggonners, but I have not even scratched the surface of this richly diverse subject.  Dozens of  intelligent, captivating, intriguing ladies enrich the history of Texas, starting with Panchita Alavez, the fallen Angel of Goliad, and Jane Long, who claimed she was seriously courted by Sam Houston, Mirabeau Lamar, and Ben Milam. 

      Moving on through the years, we have our first woman governor, Miriam (Ma) Ferguson, who was the twenty-ninth and also the thirty-second governor of Texas.  Bonnie Parker was notorious, and she was a Texas gal.  The impossibly sweet-looking and perfectly formed Candy Barr came from Edna, near Victoria.  We can’t skip Ann Richards, Cyd Charise, Janis Joplin, or Farah Fawcett.  Glenna Goodacre grew up in Lubbock.  Who could overlook Molly Ivins?  She was born in California, but grew up in River Oaks in Houston.  Though I disagreed with most everything she said, I could not wait to see how she was going to say it.

     That’s why people look askance at me—sitting here at this electric machine wondering about the difference between fact and fiction in our history books.  I had planned to start the Texas Women piece by saying, “It is a well-known fact that one writer’s courageous, strong-willed, independent woman is another’s uppity broad,” and I got mired in the idea of whether or not that statement was factual, generally accepted, or even true.  Either way, it sure is a catchy phrase.  I’ll find somewhere to use it.

Lubbock Boy's New Used Car

The man said I was real lucky I didn't have a car like this.

     I quit buying new cars a long time ago, about the same time I quit being rich.  Not that I have anything against new cars, I just hate to suffer the depreciation that occurs the first time I drive a new car around the block.  When a new car cost $4000.00, I could drive it around the block for about a thousand dollars, which was bad, but not prohibitive, especially when you consider the admiring looks from your neighbors.  At least I imagined I got admiring looks from my neighbors, and perhaps even some envy from the horse’s butt down on the corner.

     Incidentally, I didn’t quit being rich on purpose.  That happened due to circumstances beyond my control, but it happened, none-the-less.  So, with new cars costing over thirty thousand dollars and the first drive around the block running up around eight thousand, and not being rich anymore, and getting a bit long of tooth, I decided a new car was a luxury I could no longer afford.  Those long, admiring looks from the neighbor ladies and the blatant envy from the horse’s butt on the corner get to be less important as your teeth begin to get longer, and your hair ceases to grow.

     A friend observed that a young man wants everything to be stylish—his car, his clothing, his significant other, everything.  As he grows older, style becomes less important, and familiarity and comfort take on added significance.  Comfort really gets to be important, and, the way memory comes and goes, familiarity is necessary. 

     With a new car, it is no fun to hunt around for the windshield wiper switch while driving thirty-five miles per hour in a sudden downpour.  When feeling around for that switch, I always manage to turn on the blinkers, move the side mirrors, open the tailgate, and set the cruise control.  Stopping the car to locate the switch in relative safety is cheating.  The rules are that I must continue blindly down the street at thirty-five miles per hour and seek the proper control by touch only.  Slowing down or looking away from the road is not allowed, even when, without the wipers, the road is completely obscured by a driving rainstorm, and I couldn’t see a duck perched on the hood ornament.

     All this comes to mind because I recently purchased a “new” car.  I really didn’t intend to buy a “new” car; I was forced into the decision by a sweet old lady, a retired school teacher.  She was from Boerne, late for a dental appointment, and not familiar with our little city, so she was a bit late making a turn.  She turned left from the right lane, across her left lane, across her turn lane, and across my lane in the opposite direction.  She was very sorry my car was totaled, but I needed to understand that if she missed her dentist’s street, she might never find it again and would be late for her appointment.

     My “new” car is a 2004 Buick Rendezvous with all the latest electronic bells and whistles.  Really fancy stuff to a man with long teeth—stuff I haven’t had before and wonder how I lived without.  The vehicle has little sensors to tell me to change the oil, air up the tires, shut the doors, and fill up the gas tank.  All this information is passed on by a little sign in the middle of the dashboard.  It blinks, and if I ignore it, it dings or bongs.

     I have never been a fan of Ralph Nader.  I think he’s mostly to blame for the overabundance of “safety features” on our automobiles.  He is the one who took the responsibility for safely operating and maintaining a vehicle out of the hands of the driver and put it squarely in the lap of the manufacturer.  In so doing, he also helped push the cost of our vehicles out of sight. 

     I’ve always known that if I drive eighty miles per hour down the highway in a car without oil in the crankcase, I will burn up the motor.  After a few lawsuits by Ralph Nader, if I run eighty down the highway without oil in the crankcase, lights will flash, bells will ring, and buzzers will buzz.  If I don’t heed these warnings, the computer will turn off the motor, park the car on the side of the road, and North Star will give a tow truck my grid coordinates.  While I’m waiting, a sexy- voiced Australian beauty will softly ask what she can do to help.

     Last week, my car's early warning system suddenly came alive with a blinking light announcing “low tire pressure, low tire pressure.”  I pulled off the road at the first available station to fix the problem, thinking how great this “new” car was to give me warning before I damaged a tire or lowered my gas mileage. 

     The station had an air hose that I could use for seventy five cents, quarters only, but no tire gage at the hose.  I went inside and paid $4.00 for what appeared to be a disposable tire gauge from China and took my change in quarters.  I went back to the car and took all the caps off the tire valves, so I wouldn’t run out of time on the air compressor before I had a chance to fill all the tires.  I put in my seventy five cents and went to work.

     The first tire was full of air—thirty-five pounds exactly.   I hurriedly went to the back tire on that side and found the same situation.  Working quickly, I backtracked around the front of the car to the other side because the hose was too short to reach all the way around the car.  No air needed.  The back tire on that side was the same—all four tires were full of air—thirty five pounds each.  The compressor quit working, but that was all right.  I had spent seventy five cents to discover I didn’t need any air.  I went around the car to replace the little caps on the valves and was happy that I only lost one of them.

     One of the fringe benefits to always driving used cars is the number and variety of mechanics you get to know.  Typically, I run thru about six or seven of them before I catch one that I think is almost intelligent and semi-trustworthy.  He becomes my mechanic of last resort.  I carried the car to him, with the “low tire pressure” warning light flashing. 

     “No problem,” he says, after plugging his computer into my car's computer and letting them discuss the matter. “Bad sensor.  Sensors only cost about eighteen dollars each.”

     “Which tire?”  I ask.

     “Can’t tell.  The computer doesn’t give that information—only lets you know that one of the sensors is bad.”

     “Can you just turn off the light and I’ll check my own tire pressure?  I have a brand new $4.00 tire gauge.”

     “Oh, no.  Computer won’t allow us to do that.  All systems must check out on line.”

     Inside each tire, up against the steel rim, there is a little pressure sensor that works like a radio transmitter.  It continually transmits information to the on-board computer.  Evidently, not much information, just low tire pressure, but not which tire.  If the sensor goes bad, a tire man will replace it for about fifteen dollars, plus the cost of the sensor.  Sensors range from eighteen to forty-eight dollars each, depending on make and model.

     My tire man says, “We can’t tell which one is bad.  Simplest thing is replace all of them.  I suppose we could remove them one at a time and re-test until we got the right one, but that would require a lot of labor, and labor is real high these days.”

     “How much will the sensors on my car cost?”  That seems to me to be a simple and reasonable request, so I should get a straightforward answer.

     “We won’t know until we pull off a wheel, demount the tire, and remove the sensor.  I expect yours are pretty high end, but you’re lucky you don’t have a Mercedes.  Their tire sensors cost two hundred bucks each.”  I’m lucky I don’t have a Mercedes?

     I decided to live with the “low tire pressure” light and the occasional beep that goes with it.  Last week, one of my grandchildren failed to properly shut the passenger door, and a “door ajar” light started alternating with the “low tire pressure” light.  A ding started to alternate with the beep.  I stopped, got out, and closed the door.  The "door ajar" light went out.

     When the gas tank gets down to one quarter full, the “low fuel” light comes on, and alternates with the “low tire pressure” light, and a beep alternates with a ding.  When this happened last Tuesday, I stopped the car, got out and opened the back passenger door and didn’t close it properly.  I went around back and did the same thing with the rear lift gate.  I just barely engaged the emergency brake, and put on the hazard lights.

    I got back into the car, set the GPS for Junction, and went to pick up my granddaughter from dance class in Comfort.  The dashboard went crazy.  "Low tire pressure," "low fuel," "door ajar," "lift gate ajar," "hazard lights engaged," and "check brake system" lights flashed intermittently, and vied for attention.  Bongs, alternating with beeps, boings and dings created a regular symphony of computer music, accompanied by a sexy Australian cutie who kept urging me to make a u-turn at the next intersection.

     Screw you, Ralph Nader.

Nothing wrong here that a little TLC won't fix.

    

Art in Lubbock is not an Oxymoron Another of the Women In Texas Series

 "Riding into the Sunset" near the grave of Will Rogers in Claremore, Oklahoma

     In Lubbock, on the campus at Texas Tech, there is a life-size statue of Will Rogers mounted on his favorite horse, Soapsuds.  The statue was commissioned by Amon G. Carter, the Fort Worth philanthropist, and is named “Riding into the Sunset.”  Carter was a close friend of Will Rogers, and commissioned the statue in 1936, shortly after Rogers and Wiley Post died in a plane crash in Alaska.  The first casting was delivered to Fort Worth in 1940 and installed in front of the Will Rogers Coliseum.  For reasons unknown to me, but probably having to do with WWII, the statue was not uncrated or dedicated until 1947.

     The second casting, the one on the Tech Campus, was donated by Carter to Texas Tech, and dedicated in 1950.  I remember hearing about it and riding out to the campus on my bicycle to see this wonderful thing.  I examined it carefully and was impressed, but a friend who rode out with me, Carlton Huneke, didn’t think much about it--just a guy on a horse.

     The Statue faced due west, to simulate Will riding into the sunset.  Later, because an anal Lubbockite noticed the horse’s butt faced downtown Lubbock, the statue was turned 23 degrees south of east.  Legend has it that the horse’s butt then faced Texas A & M, but that was disproven by a group of students studying to become surveyors.  Whether by design or accident, the line through Soapsuds’ butt falls midway between Texas A & M and the University of Texas, and, by extension, passes near the campus of the University of Houston.  I can’t say exactly why catching all three of them with one horse’s butt warms my old Lubbock heart, but it does.

     A total of four castings of this work are known to have been made.  In addition to the two mentioned above, one is located at Will’s gravesite at the Will Rogers Memorial Museum in Claremore, Oklahoma, and I read somewhere the fourth is in Dallas, at the Anatole Hotel.

Will in the bushes at the Colesieum in Fort Worth

     This sculpture, 9 feet 11 inches tall and weighing over 3500 pounds, was done by slip of a girl, 24 year-old Electra Waggoner.   Amon Carter, a family friend, ordered the work when she was 20, and she delivered it four years later.  During the next several years, she became the most sought after sculptress in the country.  She did busts of many famous people of the time, including Knute Rockne, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, and several Hollywood stars.  She was young, fresh, beautiful, talented, and very, very wealthy.

     Electra was born in Fort Worth in 1912 and spent her early years on the Waggoner Ranch, near Vernon.  She entered Bryn Mawr at the age of twelve, and later studied business law and accounting at Columbia University in New York City.  She discovered a love of art, found she was very good at sculpture, and attended art schools in New York City, Boston, and Europe.  Electra married John Biggs in 1942, and he became manager of the Waggoner Estate and ranch.  John applied himself to his work and was considered by many to have been the best ranch manager in the business.  He introduced the concept of herding cattle by helicopter that is still used on the Waggoner Ranch today.

     Electra's beauty was legendary.  In 1959, the chairman of Buick Motor Division, ‘Red’ Curtice, named the luxurious Buick “Electra” after her, and I read that Lockheed Aircraft Company named their new turbo-prop airliner after her.   (I also read that the Lockheed Electra 10B, an earlier model which Amelia Earhart flew, was named after a star in the Seven Sisters Constellation.   I expect that is nearer the truth.)  I know the play, Morning Becomes Electra, was written by Eugene O’Neil in 1935 and based on Greek Mythology.  It had nothing whatever to do with Electra Waggoner Biggs. 

     Because there were two Electra Waggoners and I want to tell something about each of them, a bit of clarification is needed.  Electra Waggoner Biggs, the sculptress, (Electra II) was named after her aunt, Electra Waggoner Wharton, the playgirl, (Electra I).  Electra I was born in 1882 and was named after her mother’s father, Electious Halsell.  She was the only daughter and favorite child of W.T. Waggoner, and grew up to become a head-strong, vivacious, spoiled, and beautiful girl--a regular “stem-winder.”  Electra I travelled the world, especially the Far East, and met her future husband in the Himalaya Mountains.  He was Albert Buckman Wharton, heir to a steel fortune and son of the man who founded the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

     Bucky and Electra I married in 1902, and had two children, Tom Waggoner Wharton, who died at an early age, and Albert Buckman Wharton, II.   Albert II and Electra II would eventually become sole heirs to the Waggoner Ranch and all the assets involved.  Will Rogers once said that each of the thousands of cattle on the Waggoner Ranch had sixty acres and an oil well of its own.  The ranch was over thirty miles long and twenty-five miles wide, and is still the largest ranch inside a single fence in the country.  The first oil wells on the ranch were centered near the small town of Electra, named after Tom Waggoner’s feisty daughter.

     Electra I is my favorite—bigger than life, spoiled rotten, flamboyant, beautiful, and unbelievably wealthy--everything it takes to become a legend in Texas.  In 1921, she divorced her husband, Bucky Wharton, and began to have too much fun.  She built a mansion in Dallas at 4700 Preston Road which backed up to Turtle Creek.   It became “Party Central” for the movers and shakers of the twenties.  She made annual trips around the world and bought a home in Hong Kong, to have a place to stay when she visited.   During a trip to Japan, she had a butterfly tattooed scandalously high on her shapely leg.  Girls just didn’t do that in the twenties.

     Electra I’s long standing relationship with Neiman Marcus is well documented.  According to legend, Electra I made her first visit to Neiman's barefoot and wearing a house dress.  The clerks ignored her until she plunked down $20,000.00 and asked to see some clothing.  She went back the next day and spent $20,000.00 more on shoes, purses, and accessories.  Electra set records for single-day-spending at Neiman’s, then promptly broke those records.  Once, during a party at the ranch, a new oil well blew in and soaked her guests with crude oil.  She loaded them up, bussed them to Neimans, and bought new outfits for the whole group.  She was a hard act to follow.

     Electra I died in New York City in 1925, at age 43.  By this time, Electra II had entered finishing school at Bryn Mawr.  Electra I had three ex-husbands, but only one surviving child, A. B. Wharton, II.  Electra I and Electra II’s heirs eventually owned the entire Waggoner Estate. 

      As things happen when a lot of ego and a lot of money are involved, the two families disagreed.  Animosity started in the sixties; lawsuits started in 1991, and unless I’ve missed a judgment or settlement, continue today.  Electra II died in 2001, in Vernon, Texas.  Her daughters and Electra I’s grandson, along with dozens of distant relatives and minor claimants, are deeply involved in a series of lawsuits that no one will ever win.



Electra Waggoner Biggs with her statue, "Riding into the Sunset".  The Texas Tech Administration Building is in the background. This picture was probably taken at the dedication in1950, when she was thirty-eight.