Subject: Re: [BoundaryPoint] Proposed boundaries for division of Texas, 1850's
Date: Sep 18, 2006 @ 04:06
Author: aletheia kallos (aletheia kallos <aletheiak@...>)
Prev Post in Topic Next [All Posts]
Prev Post in Time Next
> Some of us study ghost boundaries and their__________________________________________________
> tripoints, but here is an
> interesting study in stillborn boundaries and
> tripoints.
>
> In 1853, Frederick Law Olmsted (then a 31-year-old
> journalist, later the
> father of American landscape architecture) and his
> younger brother Dr.
> John Hull Olmsted undertook an extensive trip
> through the state of
> Texas, admitted to the Union from the status of an
> independent republic
> just eight years earlier. The trip resulted in a
> wonderful book
> entitled A JOURNEY THROUGH TEXAS; OR, A SADDLE-TRIP
> ON THE SOUTHWESTERN
> FRONTIER, published under Frederick's name as
> author, but actually
> prepared "with free scope of expression and
> personality" by John from
> Frederick's journal while the latter worked as a
> literary agent in
> England. It was published in 1857 by Dix, Edwards,
> & Co. of New York
> and was reprinted in 1978 by the University of Texas
> Press.
>
> In a concluding chapter entitled "REGIONAL
> CHARACTERISTICS," Olmsted
> writes:
> ___________________
>
> NEW STATES
>
> The actual limits of the State of Texas include an
> area of 274,362
> square miles--or a territory greater than the
> aggregate areas of
> Kentucky, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New
> Jersey, New York and all
> New England. This immense region, as is well known,
> is to be divided
> ere long into five States, according to the terms of
> the Joint
> Resolution of Annexation. [The resolution is quoted
> in a footnote
> referenced here.]
>
> The boundaries of these new States are, of course,
> not yet mapped, but
> in local acceptance they are clearly enough
> indicated. The vaguest
> tavern conversation assumes a natural antagonism and
> future division
> between Eastern and Western Texas. The limiting
> line is not drawn--the
> people of the East assuming the Trinity as their
> western boundary, while
> those of the West call all beyond the Colorado,
> Eastern Texas. This
> leaves between the Trinity and the Colorado, Central
> Texas, a convenient
> and probable disposition.
>
> Northeastern Texas, or the region above the
> navigable heads of the gulf
> rivers, and having its principal commercial
> relations with Red River, is
> a fourth district, also distinct from the body of
> the State. The line
> of the proposed Pacific railroad along the
> thirty-second parallel,
> extending upon the map from the Brazos to
> Shrieveport [sic] in
> Louisiana, may indicate its southern limit.
>
> Northwestern Texas remains. It will still be the
> largest State of the
> Union, as its great plains are only adapted, so far
> as known, for a
> sparse population of herdsmen and shepherds. It
> would extend as far
> east, perhaps, as a line drawn north from the Brazos
> at 32°, and as far
> south as a line drawn from the same point to the
> mouth of the Pecos.
>
> But political necessities, and local jealousies and
> rivalries will
> control the limits as well as the time of erection
> of these five States,
> and the outlines sketched can only indicate the
> crystallizing
> tendencies, and serve for purposes of description.
> ["Euphonious
> appellations" for the five states are proposed in a
> footnote referenced
> at this point. For the Northeast: Caddonia, Sabina,
> Waco, or Comanche.
> For the East: Angelina, Lanana, or Panola. For the
> Central: Matagorda
> or Navasota. For the West: Bexar, Atascosa, Uvalde,
> or Bandera. For
> the Northwest: Estacada.]
> ___________________
>
> Note that the Olmsted trip occurred after the
> reduction of Texas by sale
> of lands west and north of its modern boundaries to
> the federal
> government as part of the Compromise of 1850.
>
> On the attached map, I have illustrated the
> prospective boundaries as
> delimited by Olmsted. This division of Texas would
> produce six inland
> and two marine tripoints in addition to those common
> to modern Texas.
> All would be wet. Those inland tripoints internal
> to modern Texas would
> be within the Trinity, Brazos, and Colorado Rivers,
> and those along the
> bounds of modern Texas would be within the Sabine
> and Red rivers and the
> Rio Grande. It is interesting to note that the
> proposed state
> boundaries would split both of the modern major
> cities of Austin and
> Fort Worth (the latter of which aptly bills itself
> as "where the West
> begins.")
>
> This particular proposal for the division (or
> multiplication) of Texas
> into five states was derailed by the coming of the
> War Between the
> States (1861-1865). No congressional authorization
> for a division
> existed in the Confederate States of America. Of
> course, this is far
> from the only historic proposal for the division of
> Texas. For details
> on others, both earlier and later, see
> http://tinyurl.com/3db3z .
>
> Lowell G. McManus
> Leesville, Louisiana, USA