Frontier Texas! In Abilene

Frontier Texas!  is a combination rest stop and museum - just off Interstate 20 in Abilene. The building is patterned after a frontier fort complete with a parade ground with adobe structure with overhands to provide shade. There are picnic tables in that shade! The buffalo silhouettes on tall poles turn in the wind; the flag flutters.

Inside the sculpture of Longhorns driven through water at the entrance was the first indication that this was more that we had anticipated: two theaters - one in-the-round - and holographic speakers talking about their lives with lots of more traditional museum displays in-between. The multiple perspectives this museum offers into the frontier history of Texas are more diverse than in older museums; they include:   

- The Indian with family dead or scattered,
- The woman that survived capture by Indians and admitting in her later years that if she had known what it would be like she would not have to Texas,
- The former slave turned teamster,
- The bar tender than had been a lawman, and
- The cowboy. 

The slaughter of the buffalo is emphasized with a large display and a pile of skulls with a red light shining down on them. The last stage of the museum is the theater in the round. The seats are sections of tree trunks so it is easy to turn all around to see the various parts of the unfolding stories: a stampede….and Indian raid. 

Frontier Texas! offers a view of the time that attempts to be realistic rather than romanticized. Well done!

June 2013 Road Trip

My road trip a few weeks ago took me from Dallas TX to Tucson AZ. The route went through Dallas - Fort Worth - Weatherford - Abilene - Midland - Pecos - El Paso - Las Cruces - Tucson…and back. On the way out we made a side trips into Abilene for the Frontier Texas exhibit and from Las Cruces to White Sands National Monument. On the way back we stopped at Clark Gardens near Weatherford. I have some future posts about those places. This post is about the scenes from the road.

It turns out that the pictures from Tucson back were the better ones - so the slide show below starts in Tucson and includes the scenes from the road in the three states. All three states have increased decoration of bridge abutments and overpasses along their interstates in recent years. They emphasize architecture, natural features and colors of the area. I captured some of the more unusual ones. El Paso seemed to have the most extensive and the most elaborate - in muted colors that seemed to fit the environment of El Paso.

The clouds were also noticeable. Their thickness built up in the afternoon of our first day of driving from Tucson. We had quite a rainstorm about an hour past El Paso. At first we thought we might be able to drive from underneath the big cloud…but it was as speedy as we were. The speed limit in that stretch is 80 mph but we slowed down in the deluge.

All three states have rest stops…many of them quite scenic. And they had picnic tables with shade - and situated to catch the breeze; we enjoyed picnic lunches even in the June heat. The welcome centers are even more elaborate. I took a picture of the sign and the doors of the one in New Mexico. The Texas rest stops included mosaics on the walls….and photogenic insects because they are so ‘open.’ As we got closer to Dallas we managed to take the route through Weatherford rather than return to the highway after our stop at Clark Gardens - so I got a picture of the center of town while we were stopped at a light. From there it was Fort Worth and Dallas traffic…not photogenic. We were all glad to get out of the car and stretch!