Welcome to my Texas page. This page is intended to be a comprehensive source of information about the State of Texas. I would appreciate receiving any URLs via e-mail of Texas facts. My e-mail address is chupacabrastoo@hotmail.com.
New to this page is the section I call "Texas Cheers and Jeers." I am soliciting comments about Texas, both pro and con. I would especially like to receive stories of personal experiences. I will post them in that section. I reserve the right to exclude propaganda and anything else that I consider to be irrational. If you have what seems to be reasonable complaints, I'll post them, but please be be as specific as possible. All submissions should be to chupacabrastoo@hotmail.com.
TEXAS CHEERS AND JEERS
Admitted to Union - December 29, 1845.
Capital: Austin. Dedicated 1888.
Largest city: Houston
Area: 275,416 square miles (Approximately 1/13 or 7.5% of the total U. S. land area.
Name derived from: "Tejas," the Caddo Indian name for friends or allies.
Sobriquet: The Lone Star State
State flower: Bluebonnet
State bird: Mockingbird. Officially recognized by the legislature in 1927.
State tree: Pecan. Adopted in 1919.
State dish: Chili. Adopted by the legislature in 1977.
State shell: Lightning whelk. Adopted by the legislature in 1987.
State gem: Texas blue topaz. Adopted by the legislature in 1969.
State grass: Sideoats gramma
James Pinckney Henderson 1808 - 1858
Governor 1846 - 1847.
Born March 31, 1808 in Lincolnton, North Carolina. Came to
Texas from Mississippi June 3, 1836 after raising a
company of volunteers to join the revolution, but he
was too late for the battle of San Jacinto.
President David Gouverneur Burnet commissioned Henderson to recruit troops for Texas in the United States. He organized a company in North Carolina and reportedly sent it to Texas at his own expense.
Appointed the Texas minister to England and France in 1837 and was instrumental in getting trade agreements with those nations and recognition of Texas independence. He later influenced the United States to annex Texas.
When the Mexican War erupted, he asked for and received permission from the legislature to lead the Second Texas Regiment in the battle of Monterrey in person, rather than from the state-house. Lieutenant Governorr Albert Clenton Horton served as acting governor in his absence from May 19,1846 to July 1, 1847. The United States Congress presented him a sword for his gallantry, and appointed him a major general in the U. S. Army.
He refused to run for a second term as governor, but
served in the United States Senate from November 9,
1857 until his death on June 4,1858.
George T. Wood 1795 - 1858
Governor 1847 - 1849.
Born in Georgia on March 12,1795, and came to Texas in
1839.
He was a military hero. When he was nineteen he organized a company and fought with distinction in the Creek Indian War at Horseshoe Bend under Andrew Jackson. When the Mexican War erupted, he organized the Second Texas Mounted Volunteers and became a hero at the battle of Monterrey.
Although an aristocratic, antebellum Southern gentleman, he was careless about his personal appearance. He cared nothing for finery and wore no socks.
He made no effort to rebuild the executive mansion which had burned down, instead boarding at the old Bullock Hotel. He left his family on the plantation. His wife never came to Austin during his administration.
He was a hardy outdoorsman and, when on the road at night, would spread his blanket on the ground and use his saddle as a pillow.
He thought the Indians should "be pursued, hunted, run down and killed ..." he suggested that Texas, "should offer a liberal bounty for their scalps. His record in the Creek Indian Wars, and later as a Texas Ranger, left no question about what he meant.
He was buried on his plantation in an unmarked grave.
The state erected a marker over half a century later.
Peter Hansborough Bell 1808 - 1858
Governor 1849 - 1853.
Born in Virginia on March 11, 1808, and came to Texas
in 1836. He fought as a private in Henry Karnes's
cavaly company in the battle of San Jacinto. He fought
so valiently that Sam Houston appointed him assistant
adjutant general on his staff, and later inspector
general.
Joined the Texas Rangers under Jack Hays in 1840 and fought with the rank of major in the Somerville Expedition to punish raids by Mexico in 1842.
When the Mexican War erupted he served as a lieutenant colonel under General Taylor and Colonel George T. Wood and fought at Buena Vista. He later rejoined the Texas Rangers to protect the Rio Grande frontier.
He fought in the Civil War as a Confederate colonel,
but the war wiped out his fortune and left him
penniless. He had only a small pension as a verteran
of the Mexican War.
J. W. Henderson 1817 - 1889
Governor 1853.
Born in Tennessee in 1817. Came to Texas at the age of
19 in 1836 to fight in the war for Texas independence,
but arrived too late. He spend time in the recruiting
service in the United States and later worked as a
land surveyor in Harris County.
Participated in the Somerville Expediton, was elected to the House of Representatives of the republic in 1843 and 1844, and to the House of the first state legislature, where he became speaker in 1847.
Became lieutenant governor in 1851 and, when Bell
resigned November 23,1853,Henderson became governor
until December 21.
Elisha M. Pease 1812 - 1883
Governor 1853 - 1857.
Born January 3, 1812 at Enfield, Connecticut, and
came to Texas in 1835, landing at Brazoria. He and
his wife settled at what is now Bastrop.
Pease was a Unionist, and ran on the Union ticket after the Civil War. He lost, but became the provisional governor in 1867 by appointment of General Philip Sheridan.
Pease's administration was characterized by
development. The first free schools were established
and appropriations made for creating a state
university. Institutions were founded for the deaf,
dumb, and insane. A new capitol and governor's
mansion were built. Railroad construction and state
services were advanced, taxes were reduced, and the
state debt almost eliminated.
Hardin R. Runnels 1820 - 1873
Governor 1857 - 1859.
Born August 30, 1820 in Mississippi, and came to Texas about 1942.
Like Sam Houston, Runnels was a whittler, but there the similarities ended. Runnels favored secession, Houston did not. Houston had a conciliatory attitude toward the Indians and Mexico. Runnels did not.
There was reportedly more fighting in Texas in 1858 and 1859 than at any other time except during the revolution. Deciding that the federal troops were not aggessive enough against the Indians, he strengthened the Texas Rangers under Captain John S. "Rip" Ford and told him to do away with the Indians.
Juan Cortina started a war along the Rio Grande to fight for the rights of Mexicans, and to raid livestock. Runnels was able to force Cortina to his own side of the border, but only after a lot of bloodshed. It caused a lot of bad feelings on both sides of the border.
Lynch law prevailed during this period, resulting from the fact that law enforcement officers were too busy fighting Indians and Mexican to protect the ranges adequately.,BR CLEAR=LEFT>
Sam Houston 1793 - 1863
Governor 1859 - 1861. Removed from office. Opposed secession.
Born near Lexington, Virginia, and came to Texas in 1835.
Served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1823 to 1827.
Served as governor of Tennessee, after which he lived with the Cherokee people, whom he had lived with as a young man. He later represented the Cherokee in Washington, D.C., to expose frauds practiced on them by government agents.
Commissioned by President Andrew Jackson in 1832 to negotiate treaties with the American Indian tribes in Texas.
In 1835 he commanded the Texan army in the revolution against Mexico.
Elected president of the Republic of Texas in 1836. Texas was admitted to the Union in 1845 and Houston was elected one of its first senators. He served from 1846 to 1859.
Edward Clark 1815 - 1880
Governor 1861
Born in Georgia in 1815, and came to Texas in 1842.
Sat as a member of the Convention of 1845 and as a member of both houses of the legislature.
Secretary of state under Governor Pease. Elected lieutenand governor in 1859 on the Houston ticket.
Fought in the Mexican War. After he was defeated for
governor, he raised a regiment and took to the field.
He was brought down by a rifle ball at the bloody
battle of Pleasant Hill. He later was able to
continue in the war and was promoted to the rank of
brigadier general.
Francis R. Lubbock 1815 - 1905
Governor 1861 - 1863
Born in Beaufort, South Carolina October 16, 1815,
and came to Texas in 1836.
He loved the confederacy and cherished its memory.
After leaving the governor's office, he joined the
confederate army and became a memeber of President
Davis' staff. He was captured with Davis after the
war, and served a prison term. For Lubbock, the
confederacy never died, and he attended all important
events dressed in Confederate gray.
Pendleton Murrah 1807 - 1865
Governor 1863 - 1865
Born in South Carolina, and came to Texas sometime
before 1855.
One of the saddest administratons in the state's history. The war was over, and had been replaced by privation and misery. Murrah was dying of tuberculosis.
Seventy-four thousand dependants of soldiers needed help that the state could not provide, military and civil authorities clashed, public funds were low, and there was little hard cash to be had for paying taxes.
Toward the end of the Civil War, rumors and threats
of punishment were circulating wildly and southern
governors were being imprisoned. On hearing of the
Confederate surrender, he turned his office over to
Lieutenant Governor Fletcher S. Stockdale, who would
serve from June 11 to July 25. He put on his old gray
uniform, mounted up and rode off to Mexico. He died
there later that year and was buried in Monterrey.
Andrew J. Hamilton 1815 - 1875
Governor 1865 - 1866
Born in Huntsville Alabama on January 28, 1815, and
came to La Grange, Texas in 1846.
Appointed to govern a defeated, disorganized,
debt-ridden Texas, and to get Texas back into the
Union as a full-fledged state as quickly as
possible. Because the real authority was with the
military, Hamilton was little more than a
figurehead.
James W. Throckmorton 1825 - 1894
Governor 1866 - 1867
Born in Sparta, Tennessee on February 1, 1825, and came to Texas in 1841.
The only doctor ro serve as governor of the state of
Texas. Elected governor in 1866, he was removed by
General Philip Sheridan in 1867 as "an impediment to
Reconstruction."
He later served in the Texas legislature and was one
of the seven who voted agains secession. But he
served in the Confederate army knowing it was a lost
cause.
Elisha M. Pease 1812 - 1883
Governor 1867 - 1869
Born January 3, 1812 at Enfield, Connecticut, and
came to Texas in 1835, landing at Brazoria. He and
his wife settled at what is now Bastrop.
Pease was a Unionist, and ran on the Union ticket after the Civil War. He lost, but became the provisional governor in 1867 by appointment of General Philip Sheridan.
Pease's administration was characterized by
development. The first free schools were established
and appropriations made for creating a state
university. Institutions were founded for the deaf,
dumb, and insane. A new capitol and governor's
mansion were built. Railroad construction and state
services were advanced, taxes were reduced, and the
state debt almost eliminated.
Edmund J. Davis 1827 - 1883 (R)
Governor 1870 - 1874
born in St. Augustine, Florida on October 2, 1827,
and moved to Texas in 1848.
It has been said that Davis was second only to John A. Murell, the "preaching bandit" as a villain. Both men had convictions that some people, even classes of people, needed to be done away with. Murell posed as a preacher, plotting the downfall of the South by means of a slave rebellion. Davis worked for the downfall of the Confederated in Texas. Both men were willing to use any means to accomplish their objectives.
Both men had apprently been embittered by defeats and had turned to revenge. Murrell was branded and sent to prison. Davis had had been defeated as a candidate to the Secession Convention. He had fled to Mexico but was caught by Texas Rangers and scheduled to be hanged, but he escaped the rope. While awaiting his hanging, he calmly rolled a cigarette and leisurely inhaled it as he watched four of his comrades drop to their deaths at the end of a rope. The Mexican authorities arrived just in time to successfully demand his release on grounds of neutrality laws. This narrow escape further inflamed his hatred of Texans.
When the Civil War broke out, he organized a regiment of cavalry, mainly Texas Unionists, and escaped to Mexico. He led the unsuccessful Union attack on Laredo in 1864. He fought in the battle of Mansfield and was made a brigadier general. His troops at disbanment were described as "the greatest aggregation of scoundrels and cut-throats that ever disgraced a uniform."
As governor, his election generally though won by fraud and intimidation, was characterized by intimidation, inefficiency, extravagance, and corruption. He was an arrogant dictator. Riots and terror resulted from actions of the state police, composed largely of blacks. By authority of the "Carpetbag Constitution," he appointed more than eight thousand officials. He declared martial law at his pleasure, and required the occupied counties to pay for living expenses of the enforcing troops.
He was the leader in the movement to divide Texas into three states, and nearly succeeded.
When Davis was defeated in the gubernatorial campaign of 1873 by Richard Coke, he refused to give up the office, fortifying himslef with black guards on the first floor of the capitol, and wiring President Grant to send troop reinforcements to back him.
Coke and his newly elected legislature maintained their position on the second floor. A local civil war seemed likely to start at teh pull of a trigger until Grant refused to intervene.
Davis ran on the Republican ticket against Oran
Roberts in 1880, but was soundly defeated.
Richard Coke 1829 - 1897
Governor 1874 - 1876
Born March 13, 1829 in Williamsburg, Virginia. Admitted to the bar
in 1850 at the age of 21 years. Moved to Waco, Texas
that same year.
Elected by his county as a delegate to the state Secession Convention in 1861 and voted for secession. He entered the Confederate army as a private and was discharged as a captain at the war's end.
Served a year as district judge, and then was elected a judge of the Supreme Court of Texas in 1861. Served for only one year in the high court before being removed by General Philip Sheridan. Sheridan, the commander of Texas, then under military rule, determined that Coke was an "impediment to reconstruction."
Reelected governor in 1876, but resigned later to
take a seat in the United States Senate, where he
served three terms.
Richard B. Hubbard 1832 - 1901
Governor 1876 - 1879
Born in Walton County, Georgia on November 1, 1832,
and came to Texas about 1853.
Hubbard was the largest and loudest governor Texas ever had. He weighed over four hundred pounds. He was called "Demosthenes of Texas" and "Eagle Orator."
Although Hubbard ran for governor, he was never elected nor formally defeated. He assumed the governorship from lieutenant governor in December, 1876 when Richard Coke resigned to become senator. He later ran for governor against two other candidates, but none received a majority. A committee of thirty two was formed, consisting of friends of the candidates, and told to choose a governor by vote. On the fourth ballot, they elected Oran M. Roberts
Hubbards tenure was beset with problems caused by feuds throughout the state. When disputes developed, the protagonists would round up a few of their friends and start a small war. Then there were a few, like Sam Bass, John Wesly Hardin, and Ben Thompson who never bothered to get organized. They worked alone. Some of the most vexing wars were the Horrell-Higgins and Taylor-Sutton feuds and the Mason County and Salt War of El Paso.
Hubbard encouraged local authorities to maintain the
peace, but when that resulted only in getting some
prominent deputies killed, he turned to the Texas
Rangers. They did not prove effective in stopping the
wars.
Oran M. Roberts 1879 - 1898
Governor 1879 - 1883
Born in Laurens District, South Carolina on July 9,
1815, and came to Texas in 1841.
Roberts was a sensitive man believing in the law and
economy, weeping as he explained to wives and mothers
why their convicted husbands and sons could not be
saved from the gallows. Or while telling
schoolteachers and parents that school funds must be
cut, or veternans of the Texas Revolution that their
pensions must be lowered. He paid off half a million
dollars of public debt and left a cash balance of
$300,000 in the treasury. He had been nominated for
governor without solicitation or consent , and it is
said that his entire campaign expenses consisted of
thirty-five cents for a telegram accepting the
nomination.
Detour. Due to problems with the page, for governors from 1883 to present, please click on this button.
John Ireland 1827 - 1896
Governor 1883 - 1887
Born near Millerstown, Kentucky on January 21, 1827, and came to Texas in 1853.
Lawrence Sullivan Ross 1838 - 1898
Governor 1887 - 1891
Born in Iowa, and came to Texas about 1839.
James Steven Hogg 1851 - 1906
Governor 1891 - 1895
James Hogg was the first native-born Texas governor.
Born March 24, 1851 near Rusk, in east Texas.
Charles A. Culbertson 1855 - 1925
Governor 1895 - 1899
Born in Alabama, and came to Texas in 1856.
Joseph D. Sayers 1841 - 1929
Governor 1899 - 1903
Born in Mississippi, and came to Texas in 1851.
Samuel William Tucker Lanham 1846 - 1908
Governor 1903 - 1907
Born in South Carolina, and came to Texas in 1866.
Thomas Mitchell Campbell 1856 - 1923
Governor 1807 - 1911
Samuel Tucker was the second native-born Texan to become governor. Born in 1856 in Cherokee County.
Oscar Branch Colquitt 1861 - 1940
Governor 1911 - 1915
Born in Georgia, and came to Texas in 1878.
James Edward (Pa) Ferguson 1871 - 1944(D)
Governor 1915 - 1917
Born near Slado, Bell County, Texas.
Impeached in July, 1917 on twenty-one counts. The state Senate upheld ten charges. He was dismissed from office with the proviso that he never hold office in the state of Texas again.
William Pettus Hobby 1878 - 1964 (D)
Governor 1917 - 1921
Born at Moscow, Polk County, Texas.
Pat Moris Neff 1871 - 1952(D)
Governor 1921 - 1925
Born near McGregor, Texas.
Miriam Amanda Wallace (Ma) Ferguson 1875 - 1961(D)
Governor 1925 - 1927
Born in Bell County, Texas.
Remembered for the most extensive use of executive
clemency in the history of Texas. She pardoned,
furloughed, or otherwise freed 2,000 convicts in
twenty months. Her husband made these decisions and
was accused of corruption.
Dan Moody 1893 - 1966(D)
Governor 1927 - 1931
Born in Taylor, Williamson County, Texas.
Moody was a progressive who made his reputation fighting the Klan in Williamson county.
Ross Sterling 1875 - 1949(D)
Governor 1931 - 1933
Born in Anahuac, Chambers County, Texas.
Miriam Amanda Wallace (Ma) Ferguson 1875 - 1961 (D)
Governor 1933 - 1935
Born in Bell County, Texas.
She went back to pardoning and paroling prisoners.
James V. Allred (D)
Governor 1935 - 1939
W. Lee (Pappy) O'Daniel (D)
Governor 1939 - 1941
Pappy O'Daniel won reelection in 1940, but decided to run for the Senate vacancy created by Morris Sheppard when the latter died. O'Daniel was elected to the Senate, and the lieutenant governor, Coke Stevenson moved up to O'Daniel's office.
Robert Coke Stevenson 1888 - 1975 (D)
Governor 1941 - 1947
Born in Mason County, Texas, March 20, 1888.
County judge 1919 - 1921
Member of Texas State Legislature 1929 - 1939
Speaker of Texas State House of Representatives 1933 - 1937
Lieutenant Governor of Texas 1939 - 1941
Candidate for U. S. Senator from Texas 1948. Lost to Lyndon Baines Johnson.
Died June 28, 1975
Deeply conservative. Turned his office over to an approved successor, Buford Jester, in 1946,
Beauford Jester (D)
Governor 1947 - 1949
Died in office.
Allan Shivers (D)
Governor 1949 - 1957
Price Daniel
Governor 1957 - 1963
John Connally (D)
Governor 1963 - 1969
To be provided.
Preston Smith (D)
Governor 1969 - 1973
Dolph Briscoe (D)
Governor 1973 - 1979
William P. Clements, Jr. (R)
Governor 1979 - 1983
To be provided.
Mark White (D)
Governor 1983 - 1987
Favorite Sites About Texas
More information on Texas governors