Texas Standard kicked off a new project in August: The Texas Museum Map. To begin, we decided to get answers to some challenging questions about museums. This Texas Extra is an extended version of that interview with Kenneth Hafertepe, a fellow with the Texas State Historical Association and chair of the Department of Museum Studies at Baylor.
Map
Looming freeze has Texans eyeing power grid
Oh the weather outside is gonna get frightful, how low could temperatures go? And what should Texans do now to be prepared? All of the state expected to be affected by plummeting temperatures. We’ll check in with the Dallas Fort Worth office of the national weather service for the latest. Also a standoff between the U.S. and Mexico over corn. Most of Mexico’s corn comes from the U.S., but Mexico’s president is considering a ban, one that could have major ripple effects for both countries. Also, the latest on a newspaper strike in Fort Worth. And Michael Marks with the story of one very expensive Longhorn. All that and then some today on the Texas Standard:
Texas Navigator App
On Google Maps you can get navigator voices in English with either an American, British, Indian, or Canadian accent. Commentator W.F. Strong thinks they should offer a Texas navigator accent – one that also offers Texas expressions and colloquialisms.
Texas Standard: December 2, 2020
With Texas reporting new record high numbers of Coronavirus cases, a warning from Washington that more needs to be done, we’ll have details. Also, as the fight against COVID-19 continues, setbacks reported in the war against human trafficking in Texas. Plus high hopes versus realistic expectations: with change at the White House, what Texas immigrant rights advocates think they’ll see when it comes to changes on the ground. And rarely has a nation been so well served by a people so ill treated. Now the postal service set to celebrate the Japanese American soldiers who saved thousands of Texans in WWII. Those stories and so much more today on the Texas Standard:
Texas Standard: April 17, 2019
Just Where do you draw the line? Gerrymandering may be legal in Texas, but now there’s a pushback in the Texas legislature, we’ll have the latest. Also, we’ve been hearing about brick and mortar stores shuttering and big box retailers leaving old spaces, so who’s filling those vacancies? To an increasing extent, it’s immigrant entrepreneurs. We’ll hear more. And did Texas once resemble East Central Africa? New images emerge from the study of bones discovered and locked away some 80 years ago. Plus is there a spending limit set by the Texas constitution? A Politifact check and more today on the Texas Standard:
What Siri Can’t Tell You
The navigation apps so accessible in our cars and on our phones are to me, magical. Siri, Google Maps and the like save us collectively from hundreds of thousands of lost hours each day by saving us from, well, being lost. Siri also may have saved a few relationships by sparing couples from arguing about whether or not to ask for directions. In simpler times, the all-perceptive woman might say, “Just admit it, David, you’re lost – been lost for an hour. Driving faster won’t get you unlost. Stop, please, ask for directions.” Then the man would say, “Just hold on and let me concentrate, Martha. Two more miles up here and I believe I’ll know where we are.”
Yet for all that Siri offers in real time efficiency and guidance, there are things she can’t do for you. She is not infallible. All of us have had the experience of being told “we have arrived” at our restaurant or hotel only to be welcomed by curious cows staring at us from a vast empty pasture.
The other thing we have lost with these apps is the splendid, colorful conversations we used to have with random strangers we’d ask for directions, such as the gas station attendant, the woman walking her chihuahuas down the street, or the slightly drunk guy mowing his lawn. Siri and company are economical communicators, giving you the minimum information you need for maximum clarity. Most of your random direction givers over-communicate. They give you far more information than you need.
For instance, I once asked a Deputy Sheriff, who happened to be giving me a ticket for alleged speeding, how to get to Highway 71 to Austin. He said, “Oh you don’t want to go to 71 from here. Go back two miles and take that FM road west and it’ll take you to Austin eventually. The best thing is it’ll take you by Peggy’s Cafe – just a ramshackle hut at a wide spot in the road – best peach cobbler you ever had in your life. Bucket list cobbler for sure. Take a bit of the sting out of this here ticket.”
See? Siri doesn’t have that kind of empathy, or, passion for cobbler.
Another example is when years ago, I stopped to ask a farmer on some country road near Abilene how to get to Highway 277 to San Angelo. He said, “Oh, just go down to that green house on the corner there and turn left. Go straight 3 miles, you’ll hit it.” I replied, “That house you just pointed to is actually yellow, not green.” He said, “Yeah, well it was green for 30 years. They painted it recently. We ain’t got used to it, yet. Most of us don’t care for the yellow.”
As I was about to thank him, he leaned his arms on my passenger door and said, “That house there is the Miller house. Three generations of the same family lived there and farmed that acreage. Jimbo and Carolyn after 30 years farming sold out last year, moved to Alpine and opened a bed and breakfast out there. Young couple, McGees I think, bought that house and painted it yellow. Bad decisions all around in my opinion. But not my business. Irregardless, I’ll wager right now that ten years from now that’ll still be known as the Miller house. Well, you best get goin’ ‘fore the sun sets on you.”
You see? Siri can’t give you that kind of local, social history with such authentic flare.
Finally, Siri doesn’t offer you the “gone too far” landmarks. She’ll tell you to turn around for sure, but she won’t say, “If you come to a rise in the road and see a Texas Flag gate on your left, you’ve gone too far.” Or, “If you pass over a creek, you’ve gone too far.” Or, “If the pavement turns to dirt, you’ve gone too far, but don’t try to turn around down there – with all the rain we’ve had you’ll just slide off into the bar ditch and you’ll need a wrecker to pull you out. No, just keep going till you get to the frontage road and circle back and try again.”
Siri doesn’t offer those kinds of extra, nuanced details.
Texas Standard: November 29, 2018
An historic new era set to begin in Mexico on Saturday. What does Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador mean for Texas? We’ll explore. Also, it’s been more than a year after Hurricane Harvey. Whatever happened to those long promised fixes to the floodplain maps? We’ll take a look. And in the first Texas city to shift to 100 percent renewable energy, plans to redesign the neighborhoods of the future. Also, the big news this holiday season may not be buying the latest smartphone, but what we’re buying with those smartphones. Our go-to digital guru Omar Gallaga has got your number. All that and then some today on the Texas Standard:
Texas Standard: August 23, 2018
Treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors: how does hush money fit in to the formula for impeachment? We’ll take a look. Also, fears of an upswing of violence on the border. We’ll hear what’s happening and why. And since 2016, law enforcement officials and social media companies have taken steps to curtail fake news and foreign hackers. With the midterms fast approaching, how well is the fight faring? Our Digital Savant Omar Gallaga takes a look. Also, the deer industry up in arms over state efforts to limit where the animals roam. Plus our weekly trip tip takes us to South Padre Island and we’re just getting started. Turn it up! It’s Texas Standard Time!
Texas Might Have Been Smaller
Texas Standard: April 4, 2018
April 4th 1968: a date that changed America. 50 years on, how do texans remember the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.? Two weeks before, a choir from Prairie View A&M performed before Martin Luther King at the Lorraine Motel where King was assassinated. 50 years later, we talk with the leader of that choir and his brother who led a reenactment of the event in Memphis. Also, the only African American owned bank in all of Texas expands to Atlanta. We’ll hear about the history of the bank and why they’re moving beyond Texas borders. And a ruling in a challenge to Texas motor voter laws. Those stories and so much more today at the Texas Standard:
Texas Standard: April 3, 2018
It’s being described as an eye popping boost for Beto O’Rourke’s bottom line: a game changer in his race against Ted Cruz for senate? We’ll explore. Also, there’s more teacher walkouts over pay, now in Oklahoma and Kentucky. Should Texas teachers be taking a cue? We’ll explore. Also, tariffs hit home. How china’s reaction to U.S. trade policies are making a mark on the Texas economy. And clinical trials of new alzheimer’s treatments haven’t been going well. Now researchers in San Antonio may have discovered the reason. Plus, will you get your next car by subscription? Why some automakers are disrupting their own sales model. Those stories and so much more today on the Texas Standard:
Why Is The Map On The Floor Of The Austin Airport Full Of Misspellings?
It looks like Austin…but the streets are all spelled wrong. Why?
Texas Standard: March 29, 2017
The dismantling of the clean power plan, a catastrophe? A former Obama Administration official says it’s the right thing to do, we’ll explore. Also the US supreme court takes a step that could have a profound impact on who Texas sends to death row. Plus public colleges and universities across Texas bracing for what looks like a perfect storm: a money pinch from all sides: so now what? And the new map being rolled out in schools across the nation, could you find Texas on it? Plus are you hungry for some mudbugs? Believe it or not, there’s app for that, and it’s proving more successful than it’s creators’ wildest dreams. Those stories and so much more today on the Texas Standard:
The Worst Land Survey in U.S. History
By W. F. Strong
You can never underestimate the value of a good friendship forged early in life. If not for such a friendship, Texas would be nearly 1,000 square miles smaller.
Before I get to the friendship, come with me up to the northwest corner of the panhandle where Texas meets Oklahoma and New Mexico. If you were looking at a map you would see that the border between Oklahoma and New Mexico doesn’t meet up exactly with the border between Texas and New Mexico. The line makes a jog to the left. It goes 2.3 miles left before heading straight south. That jog is the result of a survey error that some have called the worst survey error in U.S. history. But it isn’t just a two mile error – that error gets bigger as it continues south 310 miles to the bottom Texas-New Mexico corner, where it turns west and heads for El Paso. All total the mistake amounts to a 942 square mile error, a land mass bigger than Houston, though long and skinny, like a gerrymandered voting district.
In truth, that land should have gone to New Mexico. That was what was supposed to happen when Texas sold off its northern and western territories for ten million dollars in 1850. The border between Texas and the New Mexico Territory was to be exactly along the 103rd Meridian. When the official survey was undertaken, almost ten years later, there was a problem with water,, Indians, stars, algebra and math, which all contributed to the error that ended up a blessing for Texas.
Naturally, there’s quite a good long story behind the mistake. It is far too complex for these few minutes. I will give you the “cut to the chase version.”
A man named John H. Clark was hired to do the survey and plant the monuments along the 103rd meridian. He started from the south and surveyed northward until he ran out of access to water. So he stopped and said, “I’ll just go up to the north end of Texas and come down.” So he did.
Clark started again northwest of present day Dalhart and headed south until the native Americans frightened him off. Though he was about 70 miles from connecting his two lines, he figured it was good enough and turned in his work. His two lines wouldn’t have intersected anyway. The problem was his northern starting point was about 2.3 miles west of where it should have been and his southern corner was nearly 3.8 miles west of where it should have been. Consequently, that border slides imperceptibly 1 ½ miles ever so gently southwest over a distance of 310 miles. Pull up a google map on your phone and align the southeastern corner of New Mexico with your left straight-edge phone border. You will see that the border slants off to the right up at the top. That’s the error. It amounts to 603,348 acres. About ¾ the size of the King Ranch.
Well, nobody knew it was wrong and so the bad survey based on poor calculations was certified by the U.S. in 1891 and it became the legal boundary.
By the time New Mexico was about to get statehood with the Enabling Act of 1910, it had become aware of Clark’s error and slipped into the statehood law a clause saying that the eastern boundary would be the true 103rd meridian. New Mexico would get its land back. All was going well and nobody was paying attention to the land grab except for John Farwell, who was an original investor in the XIT ranch. Those were the same investors who essentially built our state capital in Austin. Well, he realized that the XIT would lose hundreds of thousands of acres (and mineral rights) if the New Mexico plan went through as it was.
He couldn’t get any legislators to listen and so he did what we all do in times of trouble: he said, “Who do I know?” Just so happened that he knew President William Howard Taft. They had been good friends during their college years at Yale. So he went to see his old buddy, Howard. He explained the predicament and Taft immediately summoned powerful men to his office and told them that the Clark border would be the legal border when New Mexico was made a state or it wouldn’t be made one. He said that since the boundary had existed for more than fifty years, and had been certified 20 years before, it had to be grandfathered in. Otherwise, people who believed they were Texans would suddenly be in New Mexico and litigation over land titles would never end.
And that is how a survey error, and an old friendship ended up making Texas almost a thousand square miles bigger than it was supposed to be. Once again, it’s all about who you know.
A final note of interest. There is a town out in the Panhandle called Farwell, Texas. It’s just a few feet on the Texas side of the border with New Mexico. It is named after John Farwell. Had he failed to convince Taft to keep the old border line, the town named for him would have become Farwell, New Mexico.
Sources:
Brock, Ralph H. “Perhaps the Most Incorrect of any Land Survey in the United States”
Southern Historical Quarterly, April 2006, pp. 431-462.
Haley, J. Evets. The XIT Ranch of Texas and the Early Days of the Llano Estacado, University of Oklahoma Press, 1953.
Hoover, Mike. “The Southeast Corner of New Mexico.” The Texas Surveyor, May, 2015, pp. 16-23.