Lost Architecture of the Rio Grande Borderlands

2008-06-24 Social Science

Author : W. Eugene George
Release : 2008-06-24
Genre : Social Science
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 119/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Lost Architecture of the Rio Grande Borderlands by : W. Eugene George

Download or read book Lost Architecture of the Rio Grande Borderlands written by W. Eugene George. This book was released on 2008-06-24. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mexican settlers first came to the valley of the Rio Grande to establish their ranchos in the 1750s. Two centuries later the Great River, dammed in an international effort by the U.S. and Mexican governments to provide flood control and a more dependable water supply, inundated twelve settlements that had been built there. Under the waters of the new Falcón Reservoir lay homes, businesses, churches, and cemeteries abandoned by residents on both sides of the river when the floods of 1953 filled the 115,000-acre area two years ahead of schedule. The Smithsonian Institution, the National Park Service, and the University of Texas at Austin conducted an initial survey of the communities lost to the Falcón Reservoir, but these studies were never completed or fully reported. When architect W. Eugene George came to the area in the 1960s, he found a way of life waiting to be preserved in words, photographs, and drawings. Two subsequent recessions of the reservoir—in 1983–86 and again in 1996–98—gave George new access to one of the settlements, Guerrero Viejo in Mexico. Unfortunately, the receding lake waters also made the village accessible to looters. George’s work, then, was crucial in documenting the indigenous architecture of these villages, both as it existed prior to the flooding and as it remained before it was despoiled by vandals’ hands. Lost Architecture of the Rio Grande Borderlands combines George’s original 1975 Texas Historical Commission report with the information he gleaned during the two low-water periods. This handsome, extended photographic essay casts new light on the architecture and lives of the people of the Texas-Mexico borderlands.

Master Builder of the Lower Rio Grande

2016-11-01 Architecture

Author : W. Eugene George
Release : 2016-11-01
Genre : Architecture
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 532/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Master Builder of the Lower Rio Grande by : W. Eugene George

Download or read book Master Builder of the Lower Rio Grande written by W. Eugene George. This book was released on 2016-11-01. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1865, Heinrich Portscheller emigrated to Mexico from his native Germany, perhaps motivated by a desire to avoid compulsory military service in the Austro-Prussian War. The scion of a well-known family of masons and master builders, he had the misfortune to disembark at Veracruz during the Franco-Mexican War. Portscheller and his traveling companion were impressed into the imperialist forces and sent to northern Mexico. Sometime following the Battle of Santa Gertrudis in1866, Portscheller deserted the army and eventually made a place for himself in Roma, a small town in Starr County, Texas. Over the next decades, Portscheller acquired a reputation as a master builder and architect. He brought to the Lower Rio Grande Valley his long heritage of Old World building knowledge and skills and integrated them with the practices of local Mexican construction and vernacular architecture. However, despite his many contributions to the distinctive architecture of Roma and surrounding places, by the mid-twentieth century he was largely forgotten. During nearly fifty years of historical sleuthing in South Texas and Germany, W. Eugene George reconstructed many of the details of the life and career of this important South Texas craftsman. Containing editorial contributions by Mary Carolyn Hollers George and featuring a foreword by Mariá Eugenia Guerra and a concluding assessment by noted architectural historian Stephen Fox, Master Builder of the Lower Rio Grande: Heinrich Portscheller at last permits a long-overdue appreciation of the legacy of this influential architect and builder of the Texas-Mexico borderlands.

The Civil War on the Rio Grande, 1846–1876

2019-01-23 History

Author : Roseann Bacha-Garza
Release : 2019-01-23
Genre : History
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 205/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis The Civil War on the Rio Grande, 1846–1876 by : Roseann Bacha-Garza

Download or read book The Civil War on the Rio Grande, 1846–1876 written by Roseann Bacha-Garza. This book was released on 2019-01-23. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 2020, Texas Historical Commission's Governor's Award for Historic Preservation was awarded to the Community Historical Archaeology Project with Schools (CHAPS) at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. This book grew out of the CHAPS program. Runner-up, 2019 Texas Old Missions and Forts Restoration Book Award, sponsored by the Texas Old Missions and Forts Restoration Association (TOMFRA) Long known as a place of cross-border intrigue, the Rio Grande’s unique role in the history of the American Civil War has been largely forgotten or overlooked. Few know of the dramatic events that took place here or the complex history of ethnic tensions and international intrigue and the clash of colorful characters that marked the unfolding and aftermath of the Civil War in the Lone Star State. To understand the American Civil War in Texas also requires an understanding of the history of Mexico. The Civil War on the Rio Grande focuses on the region’s forced annexation from Mexico in 1848 through the Civil War and Reconstruction. In a very real sense, the Lower Rio Grande Valley was a microcosm not only of the United States but also of increasing globalization as revealed by the intersections of races, cultures, economic forces, historical dynamics, and individual destinies. As a companion to Blue and Gray on the Border: The Rio Grande Valley Civil War Trail, this volume provides the scholarly backbone to a larger public history project exploring three decades of ethnic conflict, shifting international alliances, and competing economic proxies at the border. The Civil War on the Rio Grande, 1846–1876 makes a groundbreaking contribution not only to the history of a Texas region in transition but also to the larger history of a nation at war with itself.

Border Sanctuary

2015-09-01 Nature

Author : Morgan Jane Morgan
Release : 2015-09-01
Genre : Nature
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 242/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Border Sanctuary by : Morgan Jane Morgan

Download or read book Border Sanctuary written by Morgan Jane Morgan. This book was released on 2015-09-01. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge lies on the northern bank of the Rio Grande in South Texas, about seventy miles upriver from the Gulf of Mexico. In Border Sanctuary, M.J. Morgan uncovers how 2,000 acres of rare subtropical riparian forest came to be preserved in a region otherwise dramatically altered by human habitation. The story she tells begins and ends with the efforts of the Rio Grande Valley Nature Club to protect one of the last remaining stopovers for birds migrating north from Central and South America. In between, she reconstructs a two hundred-year human and environmental history of the original “two square leagues” of the Santa Ana land grant and of the Mexican and Tejano families who lived on, worked, and ultimately helped preserve this forest on the river’s edge. As border issues continue to present serious challenges for Texas and the nation, it is especially important to be reminded of the deep connection between the region’s human and natural history from the long perspective Morgan provides here. To learn more about The Meadows Center for Water and the Environment, sponsors of this book's series, please click here.

The Texas Landscape Project

2016-06-14 Nature

Author : David A. Todd
Release : 2016-06-14
Genre : Nature
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 722/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis The Texas Landscape Project by : David A. Todd

Download or read book The Texas Landscape Project written by David A. Todd. This book was released on 2016-06-14. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Texas Landscape Project explores conservation and ecology in Texas by presenting a highly visual and deeply researched view of the widespread changes that have affected the state as its population and economy have boomed and as Texans have worked ever harder to safeguard its bountiful but limited natural resources. Covering the entire state, from Pineywoods bottomlands and Panhandle playas to Hill Country springs and Big Bend canyons, the project examines a host of familiar and not so familiar environmental issues. A companion volume to The Texas Legacy Project, this book tracks specific environmental changes that have occurred in Texas using more than 300 color maps, expertly crafted by cartographer Jonathan Ogren, and over 100 photographs that coalesce to fashion a broad portrait of the modern Texas landscape. The rich data, compiled by author David Todd, are presented in clearly written yet marvelously detailed text that gives historical context and contemporary statistics for environmental trends connected to the land, water, air, energy, and built world of the second-largest and second-most populated state in the nation. An engaging read for any environmentalist or conscientious citizen, The Texas Landscape Project provides a true sense of the grand scope of the Lone Star State and the high stakes of protecting it. To learn more about The Meadows Center for Water and the Environment, sponsors of this book's series, please click here.

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Master Builder of the Lower Rio Grande

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