"best gall-darn tour in Texas!"

"Best gall-darn tour in Texas!" is what Dawson Granade promised in his email to us that confirmed our Fort Worth tour date and time for this morning at 9 a.m. We met in front of the Stockyards Hotel and got into his Chevy Suburban for a 3 1/2 hour tour. He will take up to 6 people on a tour, he does two per day, but this morning Frederick and I were his only passengers. Dawson is an historian, born and raised in Fort Worth and his tour focused heavily on the entrepreneurs that founded and built FW and the on going rivalry between Fort Worth and Dallas.

FW is "where the west begins" and is considered the capital of west Texas. Dawson described four frontiers that marked the financial growth of FW. 

• 1866 - Chisholm Trail & beef
• 1876 - railroads
• 1913 - oil
• 1941 - military

Fort Worth began after Texas joined the United States in 1845 and the federal government decided to build a series of forts to protect western settlers. FW was the northern most fort, but the soldiers only stayed for 7 years. Two influential, and wealthy citizens, John Peter Smith and Capt. Ephraim M. Daggett gave money and property to build civic buildings so that the city would continue to grow and prosper. At the conclusion of the Civil War many southerns left the south to begin new lives in the west and 90% of the money that built FW came from ex-Confederate officers who settled here. 

At this same time many more left their farms and moved to cities for good-paying manufacturing jobs and pay that wasn't dependent on the weather. They also wanted to eat beef and FW was becoming the center of the cattle industry, right on the Chisholm Trail. Entrepreneurs such as Smith and Daggett became wealthy catering to the cattle drivers. FW earned its first nickname of "Cow Town" because it was the last stop before cattle drivers took their herds 400 miles to Abilene where the railroad took the cattle to Chicago. 

Cowboys,  when they came through FW, wanter four things:

1. hot bath
2. hair cut & shave
3. beef steak at a table
4. to get drunk, gamble and women

Hells Half Acre, an eighteen square block section of town, provided all four and money flowed into town and FW gained its second nickname - "Paris of the Plains". 

At this time, right after the Civil War, another man, Buckley Paddock, came to FW and bought the local newspaper and became very influential in developing the economy of FW. He announced on the front page of the paper that FW would become the rail center,  communication and beef capital of Texas. The Dallas newspaper mocked this prediction and called FW a "dump" and claimed it was so wild that a panther was seen in front of the court house. (To this day FW uses the panther as their logo as a way to tweak Dallas for this insult. The panther is on police badges, building motifs and numerous sculptures throughout the city.)

About this time, the nation began the 1873 economic panic and as victims of the panic, the railroads  abandoned their plans to move into FW. Paddock went to the local bankers and talked to local businessmen and persuaded them to let their workers off for a month to finish laying the 60 miles of rail line into FW. In July 1876, the railroads began servicing FW and the stockyards began to boom. In 1903, Swift and Armour came to town and built huge processing plants and FW became second only to Chicago in beef, pork and mutton production.

One difference between Chicago and Fort Worth is that at the end of the stock-yard era, by 2000, Chicago demolished their yards but in FW investors saw potential in the yards as a tourist attraction.   

The skyline of Fort Worth - not as glitzy as Dallas.

Dawson in front of the Stock Exchange which is now used as an entertainment venue and holds a rodeo every week-end.

A panther resting in a public garden

Map of Texas with some of the larger ranches and their brands.

The bar in the Stockyard Hotel where buffalo butt beer is sold. Notice the saddles on some of the bar stools.

A mansion built as a "town" house by wealthy ranchers and used when they came to town.

Many historic cities have horse drawn carriages. Fort Worth has a horse drawn stage coach.

On the main street that runs right through the enter of the historic stock yards there are now tourist shops, restaurants, bars and entertainment. Your child can have its picture taken sitting on this Texas longhorn. It's real and bellowed every 30 seconds!

A boot shop.

There are "stars" in the sidewalks of the main street through the yards. Here are a few -

Annie Oakley

There were also stars for most of the people that Dawson told us about - Smith,  Daggett, Paddock and others.

This afternoon we got a little exercise by hiking two of the nature trails in Cedar Hill State Park.

This is a viewpoint on one of the trails. Joe Poole reservoir is a big attraction at the park.

At another viewpoint you can see "broadcast hill" where many of the local television and radio stations have their antenna. At night these antenna are lit with red lights and are quite pretty.

P.S. I forgot to mention that during our trip into Dallas we saw very few people walking on the streets. That is because there is an underground tunnel system for pedestrians. Its kind of nice because it helps with the flow of traffic in the city.