When foreigners hear the word "America," they think of Texas:
pickup trucks, cowboys, country and western music, Dallas the city,
and Dallas the TV show. Indeed, that's the image most
Americans have, too.
Now, contrast this with a state that's leading the country in
high-tech production and is at the heart of a gourmet movement with
some of the U.S.'s finest restaurants within its borders. It's home
to the largest oil industry in the lower 48 and surpassingly it is
also home to one of the country's biggest wine-growing regions. And
as more and more are discovering, Austin is America's "New Music
Capital," with the country's most important annual music festival,
South By Southwest, and it is one of the leading film centers also.
Texas is full of surprises. Nowhere in the country is the
stereotypical American way of life so entrenched, yet few sections
of the country are as influenced by Spanish, Mexican, and European
residents as Texas. With one of the largest German, Czech, French,
and Mexican populations in the U.S., Texas is hardly the homogenous
land of the white cowboy it would initially appear to be.
The Native American inhabitants of Texas included Comanches,
Kiowas, Lipan Apaches, Mescalero Apaches, and Tonkawas in the
plains; Tampachoas, Karankawas, Coahuiltecans, Jumanos, and the
Conchos in the west; and Caddoes, Atakapans, and Wichitas in the
southeast. The Spanish arrived in 1519, but didn't really settle in
until 1690; by that time they had taken a very bad Spanish
pronunciation of the Caddo word for friend, tejas, and used
it to describe the entire territory.
From then on, Texas became a crossroads for just about every
immigrant group that settled in the U.S. Large contingents of Czech,
German, and French settlers made their way to the center of the
state while Americans came through on their way to California and
Mexico. Also, many Mexican chose to settle here. Texas was first a
Spanish, then a Mexican territory, and was for 10 years its own
independent republic, with its Lone Star flag, before acquiring
statehood in 1845.
One of America's most famous and hallowed battles took place
during the Texas War for Independence: the Battle of the Alamo.
Against huge odds and an army of thousands, 160 men including Davy
Crockett, Jim Bowie, and William Travis, held out for 13 days before
finally succumbing to the advance of Mexican troops. The Mexican
victory was a costly one, as Texas soldiers fighting for
independence used the "massacre" as a rallying cry: "Remember the
Alamo!" The Mexicans were defeated soon after in the Battle of San
Jacinto, by troops under the command of Sam Houston.
Today Texas remains fiercely proud of its immigrant and warrior
heritage, and celebrates its diversity in a surprising number of
ways, from statewide recognition of the Mexican Day of the Dead, to
the central Texas Oktoberfest.
There is something for everyone is Texas, from the mountains and
white water rivers of the west to the stark central plains, from the
modern madness of Dallas and the chic cattle town of Ft. Worth to
the coastal resorts along the Gulf of Mexico. In addition to all of
this is the fascinating culture clash along the Mexican border and
the cosmopolitan chic of Austin and San Antonio.
