A New History of Old Texas

Post-script to Brandon Seale's podcast "A New History of Old San Antonio." This is the audio from my October 2024 SA PechaKucha talk, the video of which you can find on YouTube as well. As a summary of my thoughts after thinking deeply about San Antonio and early Texas history for the last decade, I'm pretty happy with it. But I'll admit that it's a little incomplete. BTW, the punchline (which you can't see in the audio version) is the picture of the Alamo that I throw on the screen at the ...

Transcribed - Published: 16 September 2024

We found another site. But so did someone else. And there's a rumored fourth site out there as well now? What in the name of Miguel Menchaca's ghost is going on? Image: Martin Gonzalez, Atascosa County Historical Commission. Photo by Jessica Phelps, , SA Express-News, April 29, 2024. www.BrandonSeale.com

Transcribed - Published: 6 June 2024

Episode 4 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. A new Spanish outpost on the San Antonio River represents an opportunity and a threat to the Apaches' Texas plains trade. The great empires test each other with equal turns generosity and violence. And a new rival appears on the Texas Plains. Selected Bibliography Alonso, Gorka. Apachería. Anderson, Gary Clayton. The Indian Southwest, 1580-1830: Ethnogenesis and Reinvention (1999). Anderson, Gary Clayton. The Conquest of Texas (2019...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 3 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. Thanks to the horse, Plains Apaches expand their influence over an increasingly broad swath of the Great Plains and Northern Mexico. In the course of one remarkable generation, they drive the Spanish out of New Mexico and absorb their old Jumano rivals, despite an epic last-ditch effort by Jumano Captain Juan Sabeata to frustrate them. Selected Bibliography Alonso, Gorka. Apachería. Anderson, Gary Clayton. The Indian Southwest, 1580...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 5 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. Following the great peace of 1749, San Antonio becomes the great outlet for native North American trade and for the mediation of Native Texas culture into Spanish society. In turn, Texas Apaches commit to a symbiotic existence with the settler communities around them, and come to take on a distinct identity as “Lipan” Apaches – the "People of the In-Between." Selected Bibliography Alonso, Gorka. Apachería. Anderson, Gary Clayton. Th...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 9 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. In the turmoil of the War for Mexican independence, Lipan Captain Cuelgas de Castro emerges as a beacon of stability in Texas. Perhaps no one saw the Texas geopolitical checkerboard better at this moment. Captain Cuelgas de Castro wins for his people recognition by the new Emperor of Mexico. But it won't be enough to secure true sovereignty for his people. Selected Bibliography Alonso, Gorka. Apachería. Anderson, Gary Clayton. The I...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 6 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. In the course of a single generation, Spanish policy toward Lipan Apaches shifts from alliance to extermination. But a generation of alliance-making by Lipan Captain Bigotes makes the Lipan alliance more powerful than ever. They beat back the Comanches to the Red River and the Spanish to a line of presidios that still cuts across the North American continent like a scar as the US-Mexico border. Selected Bibliography Alonso, Go...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 10 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. No Native Texan captured Anglo-Texians’ hearts like Lipan Captain Flacco the Younger. His exploits as a Texas Ranger and his people’s defense of Texas’ borders against Mexico make him the darling of Texas newspapers. Texas newspapers fail to distinguish, however, between hostile native Texans and Lipanes living in their midst. And Lipan wealth becomes an irresistible target of Texian raiding and retaliation. Painting of Flacco the...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 2 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. Proto-Apaches, Jumanos, and Puebloans vie for control of the Texas Plains in the face of Spanish entradas, epidemics, and slaving expeditions. Selected Bibliography Alonso, Gorka. Apachería. Anderson, Gary Clayton. The Indian Southwest, 1580-1830: Ethnogenesis and Reinvention (1999). Anderson, Gary Clayton. The Conquest of Texas (2019). Baddour, Dylan. “Labeled ‘Hispanic,’” Texas Observer, May/June 2022, July 6, 2022. Britten, Thoma...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 7 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. Spanish army officers prove reluctant to change their mindset, however, even as the Lipan alliance under the great Captain Picax-Andé brings to a definitive halt the advance of Spanish conquest. Selected Bibliography Alonso, Gorka. Apachería. Anderson, Gary Clayton. The Indian Southwest, 1580-1830: Ethnogenesis and Reinvention (1999). Anderson, Gary Clayton. The Conquest of Texas (2019). Baddour, Dylan. “Labeled ‘Hispanic,’” Texas O...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 13 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. The United States dispenses with the pretense of Native American sovereignty and adopts a policy of forced assimilation. Mexico waxes poetic about the “cosmic race” while sending airplanes to track down "Apaches broncos” living free in the mountains. The Lipan Apaches avoid the reservation by dispersing and using the reservation system to project their power and spread their religious ceremonies to the native communities of Texas, L...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 12 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. All pretense of accommodation with Native Americans disappears in the 1870’s. Lipanes are pursued equally and openly by American and Mexican forces on both sides of the border. One-by-one, they see their old native rivals picked off and carted off to reservations. But the Lipan Apaches refuse to play the doomed savage. After a brutal massacre by US Army troops at their sacred El Remolino site, they declare “war with the whole world....

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 11 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. The Lipan Apaches become proxies for a Texian guerilla war against northern Mexico, until Texian policies cut them off from their lands and their livelihoods. Ever adaptable, the Lipanes flip the script, relocating to their old haunts in Mexico and raiding Texas property. The Texas-Mexico border itself – and the freedom it offers – becomes an artifact of enduring Lipan resistance during these years. The annexation of Texas, however,...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 8 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. Pressed on all sides by European and native rivals, the Lipanes never should have survived into the nineteenth century. Yet not only had they survived, they had done so with their numbers and their range undiminished. They were wealthier than ever, and more powerful too, and would play a vital role in driving the Spanish out of Texas for good. Selected Bibliography Alonso, Gorka. Apachería. Anderson, Gary Clayton. The Indian Southwe...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 14 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. Contrary to popular usage, an “Apocalypse” isn't an ending. In Greek it means an “unveiling," an "uncovering," a “revelation.” But what have we really revealed about the most powerful, most unconquerable, most exceptional people in Texas history? Selected Bibliography Alonso, Gorka. Apachería. Anderson, Gary Clayton. The Indian Southwest, 1580-1830: Ethnogenesis and Reinvention (1999). Anderson, Gary Clayton. The Conquest of Texas ...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Episode 1 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. Killer-of-Enemies teaches the proto-Apaches, the “Nde,” how to treat with the peoples they meet as they descend into the Texas panhandle: the Puebloans to the west, the Jumanos to the South, and the Caddoan-speakers to the east. Yet the arrival of yet another newcomer – this one from across the ocean – challenges the diplomatic skills of even the most effective Nde alliance-makers. Selected Bibliography Alonso, Gorka. Apachería. And...

Transcribed - Published: 4 January 2024

Intro to Brandon Seale's podcast on the Lipan Apaches. Despite centuries of conflict with Spanish, Mexican, Texan, United States, and native rivals, the Lipan Apaches managed to do what perhaps no other native community in the United States has been able to: carve for themselves a place in their ancestral homeland without surrendering it. Join us this season on “Lipan Apocalypse” as we pull back the veil on the Lipanes in our midst and their outsized legacy on modern Texas. www.Brand...

Transcribed - Published: 1 January 2024

Episode 6 of Brandon Seale's podcast (in collaboration with Art Martínez de Vara) on the life and times of José Francisco Ruíz. José Francisco Ruíz's reputation and personal relationships went a long way toward preserving Tejanos' status in the newly independent Republic of Texas. They weren't enough, however, to ensure true equality. That was a fight that his nephew, his great-great-grandson, and many other Tejanos would have to carry on. Yet Ruíz's life stands as perhaps the best and fulle...

Transcribed - Published: 21 December 2023

Episode 5 of Brandon Seale's podcast (in collaboration with Art Martínez de Vara) on the life and times of José Francisco Ruíz. For the fourth time in his life, José Francisco Ruíz had to decide where his loyalties lie: to his flag or to his ideology. In 1835, however, there would be no hesitation. Too old now to carry a rifle, Ruíz became a sort of "first quartermaster" of the 1835-36 Texas Revolution, in addition to one of only two Texas-born signers of this second Texas declaration of Ind...

Transcribed - Published: 14 December 2023

Episode 4 of Brandon Seale's podcast (in collaboration with Art Martínez de Vara) on the life and times of José Francisco Ruíz. 1820's East Texas was a melting pot of native Texans, old time Tejanos, Indian immigrants pushed out of the United States, and newcomer Anglos. For all their distaste of José Francisco Ruíz's revolutionary past, the old Mexican officer corps had no choice but to turn to him once again to manage the chaos. It would leave Ruíz more disillusioned than ever with the pro...

Transcribed - Published: 7 December 2023

Episode 3 of Brandon Seale's podcast (in collaboration with Art Martínez de Vara) on the life and times of José Francisco Ruíz. If there was anything more improbable in Texas history than the Lipan-Comanche alliance orchestrated by José Francisco Ruíz in 1816, it was the peace brokered WITH the Lipanes and Comanches on behalf of the newly-independent Mexican empire in 1822. It would culminate in one of the most memorable scenes in Texas history, the journey of Ruíz and a handful of Lipan and...

Transcribed - Published: 30 November 2023

Episode 2 of Brandon Seale's podcast (in collaboration with Art Martínez de Vara) on the life and times of José Francisco Ruíz. José Francisco Ruíz would remain a focus of Spanish royalist vengeance after the Battle of Medina. For good reason. From his exile in Louisiana, Ruíz orchestrated a proxy war by his Lipan and especially Comanche allies against Spanish royalists' fragile hold on Texas. It would bring Spain to the brink of abandoning Texas. Eventually royalists would have no choice bu...

Transcribed - Published: 23 November 2023

Episode 1 of Brandon Seale's podcast (in collaboration with Art Martínez de Vara) on the life and times of José Francisco Ruíz. The Battle of Medina left José Francisco Ruíz the highest-ranking Tejano revolutionary in the state...and its most wanted man. What drove him to abandon a promising future in the Spanish army and turn on his old comrades-in-arms? And what price would he have to pay for this change of heart? Click here to purchase the complete audiobook of "Tejano Patriot" by ...

Transcribed - Published: 16 November 2023

Intro to Brandon Seale's podcast (in collaboration with Art Martínez de Vara) on the life and times of José Francisco Ruíz. José Francisco Ruíz lived through the most turbulent years of Texas history. What was it about Ruíz that always seemed to place him at the center of the action? What made him the man to whom Tejanos, Anglos, and Native Americans all turned in uncertain times? Join us to find out what made José Francisco Ruíz "The Man for Texas." Click here to purchase the complete aud...

Transcribed - Published: 9 November 2023

Episode 11 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. Winter Storm Uri. Texas's unique legal system. And Juneteenth. All together in one episode. Sources: McKnight, Joseph W. “The Spanish Legacy to Texas Law.” The American Journal of Legal History, Vol. 3, No. 3 (Jul 1959): 222-241. McKnight, Joseph W. “The Spanish Legacy to Texas Law.” The American Journal of Legal History, Vol. 3, No. 4 (Oct 1959): 299-323. www.BrandonSeale.com

Transcribed - Published: 17 August 2023

Episode 10 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. Southwest Airlines was born of a uniquely Texan model of regulation and a uniquely Texan appreciation for the challenges of distance. More than that, however, it came to represent Texan ascendancy onto the national political and economic scene, in ways that discomforted the old coastal centers of power, and found them agitating against the Texas model in ways that recalled nineteenth century Texans' efforts to rein in coa...

Transcribed - Published: 10 August 2023

Episode 9 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. Jack Kilby's integrated circuit set off the "Second Industrial Revolution" and I want to believe that it was the product of Texans' finely-tuned attention to energy density, going back to the likes of Gail Borden and every plains Indian that ever sat a horse. And yet, is the integrated circuit perhaps a better example of land-obsessed Texans' failing to appreciate the potential of the twentieth century's greatest invention...

Transcribed - Published: 3 August 2023

Episode 8 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. Texas's first true industrial "cluster" might have been ice-making. In the twentieth century, Texans lead the way in applying the science of refrigeration to human comfort and notched many significant firsts in the history of air conditioning. Most Texans' first experience with air conditioning was in movie theaters, and the movie industry repaid their patronage with an entire genre of films (the "Western") that helped mak...

Transcribed - Published: 27 July 2023

Episode 7 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. Anthony Lucas's gusher at Spindletop marked "a new era of civilization," yet was the product of the humility, persistence, and practical genius of three Waco-area farm boys. Oil rapidly transformed the Texas economy from stubbornly agrarian and colonial into a first-world industrial power. For the first time in Texas history, Texans began to accumulate capital and were set on a countercyclical trajectory from the rest of t...

Transcribed - Published: 20 July 2023

Episode 6 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. Railroads made Texans wealthier than they had ever been. They brought labor-saving and efficiency improving implements like riding plows, threshers, mechanical harvesters, and soon, tractors, which collectively lifted the standard of living of most Texans far beyond anything their parents could have imagined. And Texans hated them for it! Texans very conflicted feelings toward the "Iron Horse" exposed an irreconcilable ten...

Transcribed - Published: 13 July 2023

Episode 5 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. From "terraqueous machines" (??) to air conditioning prototypes to "condensed milk," Gail Borden was nineteenth century Texas's most prolific inventor. And yet he may owe the inspiration for his most successful inventions to a form of Comanche "superfood," developed with a uniquely Texan appreciation of the power of energy density. Cover art by David Moore, courtesy of IllustrationOnline.com Sources: Frantz, Joe B. Gail ...

Transcribed - Published: 6 July 2023

Episode 4 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. Samuel Colt certainly benefitted from the association of his revolving pistol with the state that most found widespread application for it use. And Texans, by and large, returned the love, coming to believe that "God made man, but Samuel Colt made them equal." Did the Colt Revolver blaze the trail for Anglo immigration into the Western half of the state? Or did the power imbalance it created violently accelerate a de...

Transcribed - Published: 29 June 2023

Episode 3 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. When they hosted the Texas Centennial Exposition in 1936, Dallas boosters had good reason to rename their football stadium and associated bowl game based on a bad pun. The "Cotton Bowl" was a nod to the unmatched roll that "King Cotton" had played in shaping the demographics and politics of Texas, where it constituted as much as 90% of the output of the state for parts of the nineteenth century. But it’s a legacy that Texa...

Transcribed - Published: 22 June 2023

Episode 2 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. When Don Juan de Oñate crossed the Rio Grande on May 4, 1598 at a spot which he called “El Paso del Rio del Norte”, he didn’t just bring with him the horses that would redraw the map of Native Texas. He brought with him the Spanish model of self-government centered on a locally-managed flood irrigation system that still serves today as the philosophical underpinning of the Texas "frontier regulatory model." It was the only...

Transcribed - Published: 15 June 2023

Intro to Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. I've come to worry that "History" (capital-H) focuses too much on individuals and ideologies. Individuals and ideologies can move history, no doubt…but just as often, I’ve come to believe, they ride historical waves, rather than make them. Every now and then, however, some invention, some innovation, or just some change in how technology is used comes along and moves history forward with a momentum of its own, subtler perhaps...

Transcribed - Published: 8 June 2023

Episode 1 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Engines of Texas History. The return of the horse to the North American continent and its domestication by people of the Texas plains redrew the map of Native North America and defined the spheres of influence of European colonial empires for three centuries. It led to the formation of highly decentralized, individualistic frontier societies that either successfully adopted the horse or suffered at the hands of those who had. Maybe “Don’t Mess with...

Transcribed - Published: 8 June 2023

Post-Script to Brandon Seale's podcast on Cabeza de Vaca. From a speech I gave at the Witte Museum in San Antonio, this is my attempt to argue that we can actually hear the themes of the famed Lower Pecos Rock Art expressed by Cabeza de Vaca in his attempt to take on the role of a "spirit guide" for the native Americans who joined him on his journey. If true, this would be compelling confirmation of the most recent scholarly interpretations of that Lower Pecos Rock Art and the worldviews of ...

Transcribed - Published: 1 January 2023

This is a speech I gave recently to the San Antonio Conservation Society about our Battlefield of Medina search with American Veterans Archaeological Recovery. Jump to 34:38 for the big reveal, and the connection we discovered between our finds and the "Blue Wing Body" found in 1968. www.BrandonSeale.com

Transcribed - Published: 26 October 2022

Post-script to Brandon Seale's podcast on the Republic of the Rio Grande. Maybe the reason that Texans are so vocal about their "independence" is because they have a different notion of what it means to be independent. And maybe the reason they're so loud about it is because they've been trying - without success apparently! - to explain their notion of "independence" for more than 200 years now. These are some of the ideas that I try out in this speech that I gave a few months ago. En...

Transcribed - Published: 25 August 2022

Episode 13 of Brandon Seale's podcast series on the Battle of Medina. The boots hit the ground and the shovels start turning dirt. Listen along for an (extended) account of our first season of archaeologic digs in search of the Battlefield of Medina with our partners from American Veterans Archaeological Recovery. Go to @54:20 if you don't have the patience for the whole build-up. A special thanks to the American Battlefield Trust, Howard Energy, Jefferson Bank, John Dickson, and all of th...

Transcribed - Published: 26 July 2022

Episode 17 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Republic of the Rio Grande. Was there really ever a "Republic of the Rio Grande"? And what to make of the legacy of Antonio Zapata. Image available on the Internet: https://laotraesquina.mx/2020/02/19/un-guerrero-viejo-sumergido-en-el-agua, retrieved 10/15/2021 Selected Bibliography Anna, Timothy E. Forging Mexico: 1821-1835 (1998). Casa Blanca Articles of Convention De la Garza, Lorenzo. Dos Hermanos Heroes (1939). Gallegos, Juan José. “L...

Transcribed - Published: 16 March 2022

Episode 16 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Republic of the Rio Grande. Fiery San Antonian José María Carvajal refuses to give up the dream of a northeastern Mexican republic, only to be defeated by his old commander, Antonio Canales. Carvajal - and his reputation - recover in the turmoil of the French Intervention, however, and he rises to his own moment in the sun as the regional hegemon of Tamaulipas. For a few years. Photo: Arista's Campaign Map, 1840, Courtesy Benson Latin American Co...

Transcribed - Published: 9 March 2022

Episode 15 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Republic of the Rio Grande. Antonio Canales lays down his sword...and emerges as the new kingmaker of northeastern Mexico. Photo of Brandon Seale at the approximate location of Zapata's last stand, Morelos, Coahuila. Selected Bibliography Anna, Timothy E. Forging Mexico: 1821-1835 (1998). Casa Blanca Articles of Convention De la Garza, Lorenzo. Dos Hermanos Heroes (1939). Gallegos, Juan José. “Last Drop of My Blood: Col. Antonio Zapata: A L...

Transcribed - Published: 2 March 2022

Episode 14 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Republic of the Rio Grande. The normally reserved Antonio Canales throws everything he has at Centralist General Mariano Arista in a desperate bid to rescue his estranged brother-in-arms, Antonio Zapata. Photo: "Zapata's Defeat" inset from Arista's Campaign map, 1840, courtesy Benson Latin American Collection, LLILAS Benson Latin American Studies and Collections, The University of Texas at Austin. Selected Bibliography Anna, Timothy E. Forging M...

Transcribed - Published: 23 February 2022

Episode 13 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Republic of the Rio Grande. Frustrated with Antonio Canales, Antonio Zapata breaks away from the Rio Grande Federalist Army...and rides into an ambush in Santa Rita de Morelos! Photo: Battle of Morelos campaign medal, photo courtesy of Art Martinez de Vara. Selected Bibliography Anna, Timothy E. Forging Mexico: 1821-1835 (1998). Casa Blanca Articles of Convention De la Garza, Lorenzo. Dos Hermanos Heroes (1939). Gallegos, Juan José. “Last D...

Transcribed - Published: 16 February 2022

Episode 12 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Republic of the Rio Grande. Just days after declaring the formation of a new "provisional government of the northern border," Federalist commander Antonio Canales opens up communications with Centralist General Mariano Arista to surrender! Antonio Zapata finds out...and the rift grows between the two Rio Granders. Photo Courtesy of the Republic of the Rio Grande Museum, Laredo, TX. Selected Bibliography Anna, Timothy E. Forging Mexico: 1821-183...

Transcribed - Published: 9 February 2022

Episode 11 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Republic of the Rio Grande. The text of the "Casa Blanca Articles of Convention," as transcribed by Professor Stan Green, and as translated by Brandon Seale, with comments from Professor Green and Lic. Jacqueline Pasquel. Photo: Canales's call to convention, photo courtesy of the Republic of the Rio Grande Museum, Laredo, TX. Casa Blanca Articles of Convention www.BrandonSeale.com

Transcribed - Published: 2 February 2022

Episode 10 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Republic of the Rio Grande. On January 26th, 1840, the Republic of the Rio Grande was formed. Or rather, the "provisional government for the northern border" was declared. Commentators then and podcasters now consider whether there is in fact a difference between these two ideas. Photo courtesy of the Republic of the Rio Grande Museum, Laredo, TX. Selected Bibliography Anna, Timothy E. Forging Mexico: 1821-1835 (1998). Casa Blanca Articles ...

Transcribed - Published: 26 January 2022

Episode 9 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Republic of the Rio Grande. Under the command of Antonio Zapata, Antonio Canales and José María Carbajal, the Rio Grande Federalists win their greatest battle to-date. Yet diplomatic recognition eludes them, as a new Centralist opponent emerges with a knack for the public relations game – General Mariano Arista. Selected Bibliography Anna, Timothy E. Forging Mexico: 1821-1835 (1998). Casa Blanca Articles of Convention De la Garza, Lorenzo. Do...

Transcribed - Published: 19 January 2022

Episode 8 of Brandon Seale's podcast on the Republic of the Rio Grande. Antonio Zapata - the "mulato" son of a domestic servant and a cowboy - establishes himself as the kingmaker over Northeastern Mexico. And led by San Antonian José María Carvajal, the Rio Grande Federalists call on some old allies in the fight against Centralism - the Texians. Selected Bibliography Anna, Timothy E. Forging Mexico: 1821-1835 (1998). Casa Blanca Articles of Convention De la Garza, Lorenzo. Dos Hermano...

Transcribed - Published: 12 January 2022