Sam Houston

Friday I drove from Houston up to Fort Worth, which is kinda like a twin city to Dallas. The two cities are slowly growing together to the point where it's hard to say where one ends and the other begins. On the way up I spied with my bleary little eye a fuckin huge statue and my interest was piqued to the point where I just had to get off the freeway and go back.

It turned out to be a statue of that magnificent Texas statesman, Sam Houston. Unbeknownst to yours truly I was now in the vicinity of Huntsville, TX, where Houston spent the later years of his life. Houston came west after being born in Virginia and having spent his early years largely in Tennessee, where he rose to become governor. After Texas was adopted as the 28th state he became governor here too, and he is the only man to have been governor of two different states.

Houston's an interesting character, not just because of his political exploits, which also included two stints as president of the Republic of Texas, but also because of his more personal history. Of Scots-Irish stock, he spent years among the Cherokees and became a citizen of that nation and even took a wife from them. He participated in the War of 1812. He beat a Congressman over the head with a cane and fled to Mexico rather than pay the fine. He was also into funny handshakes.

Though a slave owner and a Southerner, he opposed the spread of slavery and supported strongly the union he had fought so hard to include Texas in. During a debate in the Senate, he uttered these words, which I thought interesting to include here for their almost prophetic foresight: "... what fields of blood, what scenes of horror, what mighty cities in smoke and ruins– it is brother murdering brother ... I see my beloved South go down in the unequal contest, in a sea of blood and smoking ruin."

Houston, in short, was one of those colorful characters one can so often read about, but which are sadly lacking in today's clinical society. When Civil War came, he refused to swear allegiance to the Confederacy and was forced out of the governorship. He retired to Huntsville, where he died in 1863, aged 70. The city of Houston is named after him and he remains possibly the greatest hero Texas has ever produced.



The statue is 77 feet high, including the foundation. It is the largest monument to an historical person in the United States (or so they claim).