I decided to enter the H-E-B read. Write. Win. scholarship contest! The prompt is: "Looking back at Texas history since Texas became a state in 1845, who in your opinion has been the most influential Texan? why?" The results will be anounced aroun august 31st. I really hope I win! If I do I will Get a $15,000 scholarship witch will aid me with my financial needs for Acupuncture School.
Wish me luck!
The Rainbow Zbra
Lady Bird Johnson
Still influencing Texas
Lady Bird Johnson greatly influenced Texas with her awareness of the environment and her media projects. Lady Bird was born in 1912, with the name Claudia Alta Taylor, to parents, Minnie and T.J. Taylor, in Karnack, Texas. She was given the nickname, “Lady Bird” when an African-American nurse declared she was “purty as a ladybird.” She visited Texas often when serving as First Lady to her husband, President Lyndon Baines Johnson.
After three miscarriages she gave birth to two girls--Lynda Bird, the eldest and Luci Baines, the youngest. Lyndon B. Johnson shared his wife’s love for the land and used his political power to help her pursue her dreams to beautify America which led to her focus on Texas highways.
In 1943, Austin was a small town with only two radio stations: KTBC and KNOW. Mr and Mrs. Johnson bought KTBC and Lady Bird was put in charge. KTBC was not running smoothly with only 250 watts of signal; but the control center was even worse. There were papers strewn everywhere and dust and grime covered all the surfaces. Beautification was Lady Bird’s life
so she could not stand this. Lady Bird went right to work paying bills and cleaning the floors.
“I spent one day myself with a bucket full of soap and rags and whatever suitable things there were, washing the windows while some of them (employees) just stood there with their mouths open thinking, ‘what kind of person have we got here?’ ” She also upgraded the signal to 1,000 watts. Soon the station was worth half a million dollars. Today the station is called KLBJ and is broadcasted on 93.7 FM and 590 AM.
From the Eisenhower presidency through the Johnson presidency, highways running through Texas were being destroyed, strewn with abandoned cars and illegal junkyards.
Businesses were taking advantage of the long stretches of space, filling the roadsides with billboards. The once beautiful Texas Hill Country and grasslands were disappearing at a frightening pace. The small roadside committees and garden clubs tried their best to keep things under control, but were quickly losing hope. Lady Bird and other authorities who saw the issue worked vigorously to pass laws to control the use of billboards in non-commercial areas. Lots of Texans were against the idea, but because of Lady Bird’s popularity and political influence, they were moved to vote with her. After the bill passed, there wasn’t much obvious movement toward beautiful highways, but soon reports came saying that 2,300 junkyards had been removed or screened off and 1,055 more illegal ones removed. However, there were still 11,000 that required attention. Lady Bird’s Highway Beautification Act brought awareness to the importance of preserving the natural beauty of Texas.
In 1971, when Lady Bird was in London, she stayed in the same hotel as Austin’s Mayor Rob Butler and his wife, Ann. They stood on one of the balconies that looked down at the beautiful Thames Path that runs along 184 miles of England’s most famous river, the Thames River. Lady Bird wondered if they could make a similar path on Austin’s Town Lake. At the time the lake was run down and ruined--the trees running along the banks were crushed from too many floods, and the shore line was strewn with litter and weeds. Mrs. Butler turned to her husband for support, and they created the Town Lake Beautification Committee. To beautify the area and make it more attractive and useful as a public place the committee raised funds to plant hundreds of trees along the banks of the lake. They spent two years beautifying the trails. When people in Austin wanted to rename it Lady Bird Lake, she declined the offer, but after she died, it was named Lady Bird Lake anyway! Texans and visitors still enjoy jogging the beautiful trails.
The Town Lake Beautification Committee’s largest fundraiser was held at the LBJ ranch.
The LBJ ranch is the beautiful homestead that belonged to Lady Bird and Lyndon B. Johnson. While getting the place ready to call home, Lady Bird spread seventy-five pounds of bluebonnet seeds on either side of the Pedernales River that ran through the property. Soon, the house was a lovely place to hold parties, barbecues, and political events. On August 27, 2008 the ranch officially opened to the public.
When her husband died in 1973, Lady Bird Found herself needing a new project. She found a perfect one in the National Wildflower Center; Lady Bird donated $125,000 and sixty acres of land to build a center in Austin, Texas. Lots of impactful research poured in and out of the center every year. Part of the research showed that in Spring when wildflowers grow, not only do they make highways beautiful to look at, but their presence decreases the need to mow; less mowing decreases the pollution from lawn mowers. Once the center got too small for further research, Lady Bird came to the rescue again. She located a new plot of land and they were able to expand the project. One of the many things the center did was to repopulate and relocate rare and dying flowers. Texas is well known for our wildflowers and without Lady Bird and her Wildflower Center, many flowers may have been lost completely.
In 1993 her health began to fail; she suffered strokes and became blind. She died August 11, 2007 at home of natural causes, surrounded by friends--a Catholic priest(Father Robert Scott), her daughters Luci and Lynda. Luci later remarked that one week before her death, Lady Bird made a public appearance, and visited the Blanton Museum of art. “It was a scene, Mother was on IV, oxygen tube, and a feeding tube. It looked like a mobile hospital. But she had a wonderful time.” Lady Bird Johnson was a truly inspiring woman. Her actions will influence people for years to come.
Resources used:
www.wikipedia.com
www.townlaketrail.org
www.nps.gov
www.nationaltrail.co.uk
www.tab.org
Gould, Lewis L. Lady Bird Johnson, Our Environmental First Lady. Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 1988.
Appelt, Kathi. Miss Lady Bird’s Wildflowers, How a First Lady Changed America. HarperCollins 2005.
