#authorofthewestwardsagas

May 71 min read

Lusitania Sunk by German Sub

On May 7, 1915, the Lusitania RMS was sunk twelve miles off the coast of Ireland by a German submarine. The pride of the Cunard Line went...

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david921866

Apr 261 min read

Louis Franke - 1818-1873

German born Louis Franke arrived in Texas in 1845. He came with a master’s degree in law from the University of Jena. Franke volunteered...

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david921866

Apr 81 min read

Fayette Smith’s Last Battle

On April 8, 1864, thirty-two-year-old Fayette Smith from Navasota, Texas, was wounded at the Battle of Mansfield in Louisiana. Not his...

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david921866

Mar 81 min read

Conrad Meuly – 1812-1865

Swiss born merchant, Conrad Meuly, came to the Republic of Texas from New York with silk hose, scarves, and bolts of expensive fabrics....

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david921866

Feb 191 min read

Texas Statehood

One hundred seventy-eight years ago, the City of Austin stopped at Noon on February 19, 1846. The town of several hundred residents and...

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david921866

Feb 92 min read

Austin Lyceum

The Austin Lyceum was granted a charter on February 5, 1841. The first charter issued for a learned society in the Republic of Texas. E....

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david921866

Jan 202 min read

Andrew Jackson

Andrew Jackson was a twenty-year-old attorney when he and Judge John McNairy rode into Jonesborough in the spring of 1788. Andrew passed...

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david921866

Jan 172 min read

The Story of the Lost State of Franklin

Men fought and died to establish the State of Franklin shortly after the American Revolution. Some historians think the leaders of the...

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david921866

Jan 71 min read

Getting the News in 1843

On January 7, 1843, Charles DeMorse wrote the following in the Northern Standard newspaper. At the time, the Clarksville paper was the...

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david921866

Dec 30, 20231 min read

Angelina Eberly - Savior of Austin

In downtown Austin, Texas near Congress Avenue and Sixth Street, stands a bronze statue of Angelina Eberly holding a torch, igniting a...

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david921866

Dec 29, 20231 min read

Celebrate Austin

I’m the author of the Westward Sagas, a series of award-winning novels about my great-great grandmother Elnora Van Cleve-Browns family...

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david921866

Dec 27, 20232 min read

A Town is Born

One hundred eighty-four years ago, hundreds of men converged at a place on the Colorado River that would become the first permanent...

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david921866

Dec 14, 20231 min read

Grandmother's Stories

It was on the lawn of our Austin home that I first heard the story I was destined to write! The tale of a family member being captured by...

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david921866

Dec 12, 20232 min read

Derinda Elizabeth Kelso

Betty, as she was called, was born September 30, 1857, in Lavaca County, Texas. She had a twin brother who died before the age of five....

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david921866

Dec 5, 20231 min read

Leroy Tillman Kelso

Leroy T. Kelso was born in Mississippi in 1847 and his family arrived in Texas in 1850. In 1873, the Comanches were raiding in the Hill...

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david921866

Nov 27, 20231 min read

Alfred Givens Kelso, Sr.

Alfred Givens Kelso, Sr. came to Texas in 1829. He joined the Texas Army as First Corporal under the command of Captain William K....

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david921866

Nov 22, 20232 min read

Never in the Dark

I was fortunate to have grown up in the forties under one of Austin’s famous moonlight towers. Austin originally purchased thirty-one...

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david921866

Nov 15, 20231 min read

Code of the Cow Country

The following poem is something I found in a barn many years ago on a feed sack. I tore it off and have since found the poem in various...

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david921866

Nov 13, 20232 min read

Talkin' Texan

Being a fifth generation Texan, I have often been told I talk funny. When I travel I sometimes feel intimidated by the comments on my...

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david921866

Nov 7, 20231 min read

Texas Book Festival

It was a schoolteacher from Midland, Texas, and her friend Mary Margaret Farabee that started the Texas Book Festival (TBF) in 1995....

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