POTR # 35 Texas Art

PEACE ON THE ROAD
Texas Art
November 18 , 2007

There are many things that can be said about the human mind. One of those is that it is a time machine. The mind can transport us into the future or into the past just as easily as around the world. So I would like to allow your minds to go with mine on a two stage trip through time. The first stage is back to about 1963, in a break area of Forney Industries, where I worked at the time. There are two of the company engineers that are talking about the draftsman of the company. The draftsman was German that had been brought to America as a POW of WWII. One of the engineers was a guard on the train that had taken him and a few hundred other POWs into the interior of the USA in about 1944. The second stage of the journey will be by his words. “We started away from the East coast, left the industrial area near the seaport behind and the German prisoners were in high spirits, laughing, joking, and in general very confident that Germany was going to win the war in a short length of time. They said, ‘Is that all the industry that America has? It is nothing! Germany has twenty times that much! America does not have a chance!’” The engineer told about how the train continued west and went through another industrial area and back out into the open countryside. He said that the German POWs said something like, “Big deal, America has two industrial areas. But both of them combined are only a fraction of what Germany has. You Americans should just give up and not die for a lost cause.” The engineer described how the train went through industrial center, after industrial center, after industrial center for days and even weeks. The cities of industry and farm communities, and small cities passed by the windows of the train seemingly without end. The Germans were aware that they were not seeing all there was, and that they were not seeing a small country. He finished with, “Before we got to our destination the POWs were silent, moody, depressed. There were no jokes, there was no laughter, and there were no comments about how America was going to lose in a short time. The prisoners knew that the industrial power, the agricultural capacity and the population of America was immense and that Germany was going to lose in time.”

CADILLAC RANCH IN AMARILLO, TEXAS

All Americans know that this is a big country that is called America. Like the German POWs found out, a lot of figures in books do not make the same impression as driving through the country and seeing with your own eyes. America is a land of multiples, there are few things that are really just one. There is only one, “The Statue of Liberty,” but across the nation are hundreds of Statues of Liberty in front yards, in restaurants, in parks and other places. There is only one, “The Golden Gate Bridge,” but there are thousands of beautiful bridges to cross and to admire. There is only one, “The Grand Canyon,” but there is a Grand Canyon of the East, a Grand Canyon of Texas, a Grand Canyon of New Mexico, and there are other places called Grand Canyons.. “The Cadillac Ranch” in Texas has inspired other car art displays, like “Car Henge” in Nebraska, “Cars on a Spike” in Illinois. In 1974 ten Cadillacs were half buried nose down facing west “at the same angle as the Cheops’ pyramids of Egypt”. The ten Cadillacs represent every different style of tail fin of the Cadillac that was built during the “Golden Age” of the American automobile, which is considered to be from 1949 through 1963. The distance of the display from any “authority” seems to have encouraged the graffiti artist to maintain a constantly changing layer of spray paint. This seems to actually be encouraged by the owner because he will spray paint all ten of the Cadillacs a solid color to provide a new canvas for the artist. Not only have the graffiti artist decorated the ten Cadillacs but they have decorated the gate into the field, the trash container out by the highway frontage road, and a large section of the highway itself. Somewhere close is artwork called Combine City, and also Tractor Town, which are spin offs of Cadillac Ranch. It is a fun place to visit and see. It may be offbeat but it is some of the art of Texas.

VIEW FROM THE TOP OF THE CATHEDRAL OF JUNK IN AUSTIN, TEXAS

Every time that I write one of these I feel like I should say something like, “I never know what kind of surprise or neat or beautiful or weird things I will see around the next corner.” Of course that statement is so very true. I think that there is a person in every town that has talents that are special in some way. The thing that has to be done is to seek out those talents. When we were in Austin, Texas I read about a guy that had something that he called the Cathedral of Junk. With a name like that it was just one of the things that cried out “Come See Me!” Well at least that is what I heard, I am not so sure that Erma heard the same calling that I did. Still I think that she was glad to see it also. I am very glad that I did. It was a place that could be explored for hours and you would see something new every minute. It is being built by Vince Hannemann. I say being built because he started building in 1988 and he is still adding things to the Cathedral. He estimated that in the nearly thirty years he has used sixty tons of material in his building. He has built several towers that are between two and three stories high, with walkways and stairs leading upwards for an aerial view of the back yard. All of the building is in the back yard, as the view from the street front shows nothing of the complexity that is just behind the garden gate. A structure that looks like this one does should be shaky, but this structure is so solid that it is like walking on a concrete sidewalk. We said something to the builder about doing a lot of welding and he said that there was nothing welded. “Everything is fitted together like a Chinese puzzle and those thing that are not fitted together are held together with wire.” The cathedral has several rooms, with cathedral ceilings of course. One of them is designated as the throne room. The throne is built from auto springs, ceramic tile, channel iron and many items that have a source that is impossible to determine. It actually looks like it might be more comfortable than the automobile seats and office chairs or toilet seats that are incorporated within the structure. Wires that snake around through the construction carry power to TV’s, radios, lamps and other electrical items that still work. He is in the process of building ramps that will allow “people with handicaps” to get to the top so that they can enjoy the view of the Texas art from the upper level like others. There are several water features around where lilies grow and fish swim.

MY THUMB AND A TINY FROG IN THE REAR DOOR CHANNEL OF THE JEEP

As we travel we are apt to pick up hitch hikers of various kinds. We have had a very large spider that took up residence and wove a web between the front fender of the Vectra and the slide out on the right side. When we had to take the Vectra in for a repair I thought the spider would be gone. But a couple days later the web was back and ready to catch another fly for dinner. When we got down in Texas another spider decided to make a home between the slide on the other side of the motor home and the mirror. When we had to move to another campground we moved the slide in and the spider ran for cover up in the slide cover housing. The next morning it had built another web in the same area. Two or three moves are all that these hitch hikers make with us before they leave. In various places we have had small frogs that wanted to go with us too. The one in the picture hid in the Jeep and I discovered it when I opened the door. I had to chase it completely through the Jeep and out the other side to keep it from traveling with us. Another one the same size caused me to do a thing that was really rather funny, but only funny later when I had time to think about it. There is a restaurant in Rockport that we go to every Tuesday when we are in town. They have a very good all you can eat meal for $1.75. On Tuesday there are more Winter Texans there than you can shake a stick at. After we ate I picked up my camera bag and went out to get the Jeep. I put the camera in the back of the Jeep and closed the door. I saw another tiny frog clinging to the door and I reached for my camera bag on my shoulder to get the camera. It wasn’t there. I thought, “Good grief, I left my camera at the table.” I hurried back inside and looked for my bag, I even asked the waitress and bus girl if they had seen it. Of course, no one had. On the way back out to the Jeep the thought went through my mind, at least what little mind I had left, that it was odd that I had opened the back door unless I had put the camera bag in the back. The camera must be there! Sure enough, it was there. I got it out and photographed the second frog. So I guess the point is that when I have an opportunity to get a neat picture everything else just goes out of my mind. I still find it hard to believe that the frog stayed on the door while I opened and closed the door twice. Maybe it just wanted to have its photo taken.


MISSION SAN JOSE IN SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS

We took the time to travel the Mission Trail in San Antonio while we were there. It is amazing that the buildings that were built in the 1770’s could be so beautiful after nearly 240 years. Buildings that are built today are lucky to survive 50 years. San Jose was built as a mission, a fortress, a teaching center and a community of several hundred people. It must have been spectacular when it was first built.

Till Later This Is Doug Of
PEACE ON THE ROAD