Tag Archives: West Texas

Beautiful Texas

Posted on April 23, 2012 | Comments Off on Beautiful Texas

A photographic (and musical) tribute to West Texas—from the Rio Grande to the Palo Duro. By the official Texas state photographer Wyman Meinzer. Take a look.

Via old friend (even if he is a Democrat) Tucker Smallwood.

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Posted in Music, Texana, Weather/Climate

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West Texas wildfires

Posted on April 21, 2011 | Comments Off on West Texas wildfires

These Davis Mountains fires are out now but this is the way they looked at their worst last Sunday. That’s McDonald Observatory’s giant HET in the foreground. Photo by Frank Cianciolo of the observatory’s visitor center.

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Posted in Texana, Weather/Climate

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More 107-inch telescope

Posted on May 25, 2010 | Comments Off on More 107-inch telescope

HarlanTelescope1

Looking more like a giant X-ray machine than a telescope, McDonald Observatory’s 107-inch reflector inside its closed dome on Mt. Locke is one of the few, if not the only, modern telescopes with bullet holes in its primary mirror. I’ve heard and read several versions of the tale. This one pretty much echoes most of them.

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Posted in Blogosphere, Science/Engineering, Space, Texana

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More Fort Davis

FortDavisMountains

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Posted on May 12, 2010 in Scribbles, Texana

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Pumpjack

Posted on July 6, 2008 | Comments Off on Pumpjack

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When I was a kid moving all over the place with my military father, I thought of these things as mechanical grasshoppers. Until my Texas oilman grandfather set me straight that they were called pumpjacks. Used to see a lot of idle ones hereabouts when oil prices were low. Now it’s more common to see them pumping, especially around major oil towns like Midland. Baby Barry and his pals in the news media can whine all they want about the alleged coming recession, but I’m wondering if it’s time, once again, to buy stock in Texas drilling companies?

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Posted in Texana

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Private road movie

Posted on March 10, 2007 | Comments Off on Private road movie

Just about 50 hours away now from the beginning of our Spring Break, private road movie to far West Texas. In which Mr. Boy, Mom and the geezer will pile into a rental sedan and hit the rodeo for Fort Stockton and beyond. Well, Fort Davis, actually, which is well beyond FS, but no longer on I-10. Rather well off the beaten track. Or so it was the last time I visited, in the late 90s. Even West Texas changes. So who knows what it looks like now? Weather forecast looks good: mild  days and chilly nights. Mr. B. is going to get his first taste of "…the stars at night are big and bright…"

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Posted in Mr. Boy, Rancho Roly Poly, Texana, Weather/Climate

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Fort Davis trip

Posted on February 20, 2007 | Comments Off on Fort Davis trip

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Preparing for what might become our annual spring break trip to West Texas, in March, this time to Fort Davis, in the Davis Mountains, whence the above scene, circa  1870s. No stagecoaches nowadays of course. It’s Interstate 10 almost all the way, to Balmorhea, anyway, then a 31-mile, two-lane jog south to Fort Davis. About half of the old fort has been restored as a tourist attraction, which we’ll take in, along with the McDonald Observatory of the University of Texas. All this primarily for Mr. Boy and Mom who have never been to either spot. Ft. Davis was never your Hollywood stockaded log-cabin frontier fort, but rather made of planks and brick. Set there in the 1850s to fight Indians, primarily the Mescalero Apache, it was home to, among others, the famed black Buffalo Soldiers. Much more, with pictures, maps and art here/Painting "Fort Davis" By Melvin Warren.

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Posted in Texana

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