Texas Brave and Strong Podcast Laurie Moore-Moore
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- History
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If you’re a native Texan, an adopted Texan, or are just interested in all things Texan, subscribe. You’ll learn things about Texas history that will surprise you and amaze your Texas friends. Chances are, they’ll tip their cowboy hats to you!
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Civil War's "King Cotton"
Cotton was the Confederacy's lifeblood. Its sale funded arms, critical supplies and paid for the government, but the union blockade kept it from foreign markets. Matamoros, Mexico became the South's "backdoor." Cotton caravans had to cross the dangerous Texas plains--fraught with bandits, Comanche, lack of water, and other deadly challenges--then, sell the cotton in a market teaming with fraudsters and scalawags . . .
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Black cowboys excelled
Post Civil War, "cowboying" was a tough, demanding job, one which attracted scores of newly freed blacks. Some were especially notable.
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Juneteenth: Emancipation Day or Not?
Juneteenth is probably an example of "What you know for sure, that ain't so! "
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Exploring the Texas Plains in 1540
Long before Texas was Texas, a series of Spanish explorers visited the mysterious land of the High Plains. These expeditions were motivated by the search for wealth promised by tales of rich kingdoms that always seemed to be "just a bit farther," but were never reached.
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PART 2: Black Bean Lottery
Held prisoner by the Mexican government, the Texian volunteers of the Mier Expedition were forced to participate in a lottery--ten percent of them to be executed by a firing squad. Who lived and who died was settled by the drawing of a white or black bean. This is a first-hand report from Big Foot Wallace, one of the soldiers who drew a white bean and lived to tell the dramatic story of the black bean death lottery.
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Big Foot Wallace and the Mier Expedition
PART I: The Mier Expedition and the Black Bean Lottery of Death
When the Republic of Texas is plagued by Mexican military raids, a planned reprisal results in the ill-fated Mier Expedition of 1842. After some success, the volunteer soldiers are told to abort, but many continue and end up as prisoners of Mexico. Things do not go well for them. As told by participant Big Foot Wallace.