Southern Methodist University - Rotunda Yearbook (University Park, TX)

Page 13 text:

100 K'fEARS AGO AND NOW The First colonists entered Texas in 1821 and settled on the Lower Brazos in Waahington County. Stephen F. Austin, the leader of the colonization movement, went to Mexico to secure more ireeczvsm of government For his colonists, but met with imprisonment For many months. This tyranni- cal ruie led to the colonists' Fight For their independence. iiihe Fall of the Alamo, March 6, 1836, proved the most disastrous battle For the colonists. This deieat was avenged by Gen. Sam Houston's overwhelming victory in the Battle of San Jacinto, April 21, and the capture of Santa Anna. The same indomitable spirit which characterized our pioneer Foreiathers' Fight For Freedom, and the ensuing development of Texas, has also been responsible For the transcending progress of Southern Methodist University.

Page 15 text:

Texas Although the development of Texas covers but a century, the Vivid history of this great territory goes back more than fourjhundred years. It was in 1519, a century before the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock, that Alonzo Alvarez de PinedaJ Spanish explorer sailing from Jamaica, made an involuntary landing near the mouth of the Rio Grande and drew the first map of the Texas coast. In 1528, Cabeza de Vaca, a ship- wrecked survivor of the expedition which Narvaez led to Florida, landed near the present Galveston with several companions. He lived for six years among the coastal Indians, finally mak- ing his escape and setting out on an in- credible journey which took him across Texas and finally to a Spanish outpost 011 the lViIeXican west coast. His Vivid account of his adventures, published in Spain, is the earliest detailed description of the Southwest. The first organized effort to explore the region was made in 154.1 by Coro- nado, a captain whose expedition was sent to locate seven fabled cities of Cibola which the Spaniards believed to exist in the North. Coronado found no gold, but he did cross the western portion of Texas, as well as states to the north. He was the first of a line of conquistadores whose exploits established the Spanish claim to the Southwest. Despite frequent explorations, a cen- tury and a half passed before colonists followed the conquistadores to Texas. It was in 1682 that a colony of Spaniards and semi-civilized Indians, driven from New NIeXico by an uprising of Pueblos, settled on the Rio Grande just below the present city of El Paso and called their 4:111: