Karen Bush Gibson - Texas History for Kids. Lone Star Lives and Legends, with 21 Activities

Copyright 2015 by Karen Bush Gibson

All rights reserved

First edition

Published by Chicago Review Press Incorporated

814 North Franklin Street

Chicago, Illinois 60610

ISBN 978-1-61374-989-0

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Gibson, Karen Bush.

Texas history for kids : Lone Star lives and legends, with 21 activities / Karen Bush Gibson. First edition.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-61374-989-0 (trade paper)

1. TexasHistoryJuvenile literature. I. Title.

F386.3.G53 2015

976.4dc23

2014031088

Cover and interior design: Monica Baziuk

Interior illustrations: Jim Spence

Cover images: Front, counterclockwise: Alamo, iStock Augustine Change; Heywood #2 gusher, LOC; folkloric dancer, Shutterstock Jeff Schultes; astronaut, iStock Purdue9394; Battle of the Alamo, LOC. Back, from top: Hurricane of 1900 wreckage, LOC; Samuel Houston, LOC; Mission Concepcin, Karen Bush Gibson.

Printed in the United States of America

5 4 3 2 1

To Ray and Betty Bush for introducing me to Texas and being such amazing parents

INDEX

H ow do you explain Texas to someone who has never been there? Do you talk about the Wild West qualities or the modern cities of steel and glass erupting from the plains? Is Texas the mesas, plateaus, and desert valleys of West Texas? The long line of beaches, islands, and marshes along the coast? Or the gently rolling land of Hill Country, or the Piney Woods of East Texas?

You can ask the same about the peoplecowboys, oilmen, strong women, Latinos, or technology geniuses. Like many states, the area today known as Texas has been ruled and influenced by many countries and culturesSpanish, Mexican, French, German, Czech, and more. Each left its mark.

Texas is many things to many people.

Texas is a huge state268,820 square milesand probably has the most recognizable shape on the map. That area covers a variety of geographical terrains and people.

But Texas is also an attitude. Texans like to brag that they do things big in the Lone Star State. That includes the history. From the early dinosaurs to flying in space, Texas delights in the stories of its land and people.

For years, a story has circulated that Texans were quite upset at losing the distinction of being the largest state in the Union when Alaska was admitted as a state in 1959. Alaska, at over twice the size of Texas, was upstaging Texas, and that just would not do. The story says that some Texans got together and joked about melting Alaska.

Texas has a population of over 26 million people, coming in second to California. But Texans have more room to move around with 96.3 people per square mile; California has to fit 239.1 people into the same area.

Author John Steinbeck may have said it best in