“With this bill, the American people are going to think they are being sold the same bill of goods as before on border security. We should scrap this bill and the whole debate until we can convince the American people that we have secured the borders or at least have made great headway.”
Announce, Fred. Announce.
Or is there a bill?
Via Instapundit
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Posted in Scribbles, South of the Border, Texana
Among the Latino World War II stories that documentarian Ken Burns missed/ignored is that of El Pasoan Richard Candelaria, an Army Air Force pilot who grew up in California.
This morning the daily ran a piece on the Burns debacle fronted by a great old photo of Candelaria in full knight-of-the-air panoply, including leather helmet, flying goggles, Mae West, dangling radio cable and oxygen mask, and what look like elbow-length fire-retardant gloves. The photo is here, though he isn’t mentioned in the story. Too bad. He was one of only five Latino-American fighter aces of World War II:
“’It’s the most exclusive club, or association, in the world,’ he said of the American Fighter Aces Association, of which he is a charter member. ‘You can’t buy your way in. You can’t influence your way in. You can’t talk your way in. There’s only one way in: aerial combat.’”
Candelaria flew P-38s and P-51 Mustangs, escorting bombers to their targets and back. He had six confirmed kills, and a possible seventh in one of the Nazi’s new jet fighters. Part of his story can be found here, but the most complete one is here at the University of Texas oral history project, which includes his escape from a POW camp after being shot down. Nose art on his P-51, the hottest fighter of the war, was: “My Pride and Joy.”
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Posted in Texana
Tagged Ken Burns, Richard Candelaria, World War II American fighter ace
When Ken Burns decided to forgo any mention of Latino-American troops in his upcoming doc on World War II, he skipped over the more than 500 stories collected here by the University of Texas’ oral history project. They have a new web site in the works. I hope it has some transcripts of the actual interviews and some of their good photographs that have been reproduced in newspaper articles.
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Posted in Scribbles, South of the Border, Texana
Tagged Ken Burns, University of Texas, US Latinos & Latinas World War II Oral History Project
Looks like the PBS documentarian will re-edit his WW2 opus, according to Diane Holloway in the daily, to weave in the Latino perspective (including 15 medals of honor) that he had ignored, but he needed a little arm-twisting:
"Burns is not accustomed to criticism, and his response until last week to the Latino community’s concerns was jarring. After initially ignoring the complaints, he and PBS executives met with several members of Hispanic groups, including Galán and Rivas-Rodriguez, in Washington, D.C., in April."
Apparently he will use stuff by Austin documentarian Hector Galan. Good, and good piece worth a read.
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Posted in Civil War, Scribbles, South of the Border, Texana
Tagged Austin American-Statesman, Diane Holloway, Hector Galan, Ken Burns, Latino
The family sloop, a 1985 Catalina 22, looks better in this photo than it did up close, at the time, as it was covered with grey mold spots after a year without use on Lake Travis. During the drought the docks were moved to where they were inaccessible most of the time. Now it’s back and almost four weeks since the photo was taken, the exterior is three-quarters clean. Elbow grease and Sof Scrub is all it takes. Still have to finish the cockpit and clean out the cabin, but it’s coming along. The admiral wants to sell it and I had planned to, while it was inaccessible, but of course nobody wanted to buy it then. But after 22 years of sailing it, it’s hard to part. Has to be cleaned and the outboard overhauled to sell it, anyway. If I can lure Mr. B. onto it a couple of times once school is out on May 24, I may have the winningest reason to keep it. Racing is something I’ve never cared to do, but he might find it exciting.
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Posted in Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly, Sailing, Texana, Weather/Climate
Tagged Catalina 22, Lake Travis
According to the Lower Colorado River Authority, which keeps track of such things, Lake Travis now stands at 673 feet above mean sea level. That’s eight feet below full, which is not normal for this time of year. What is normal for this time of year is big rains in the lake’s watershed. Some homeowners out there could go from vanished lake to flooding in a span of six months.
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Posted in Texana, Weather/Climate
The 1883 Keidel Memorial Hospital, on Main Street, was closed when Mr. B.’s mom and I started visiting Fredericksburg every spring. That was about 1990, when the town was still pretty small and uncrowded. But it was poised to boom and it seems to have grown a little or a lot ever since. Compressing the photo fuzzes a lot of the detail, alas. The old hospital, presumably named for early architect Albert Keidel, now has a basement restaurant and Der Kuchen Laden, a ground floor cookware shop. But it still reminds me of when we’d stroll the street in the evening and see hardly anyone else around.
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Posted in Texana
Tagged Albert Keidel, Der Kuchen Laden, Fredericksburg, Keidel Memorial Hosipital
THE TEXAS SCRIBBLER 