Last Day in San Antonio....Caching & Sightseeing 5/2/2010

We headed into San Antonio this morning to do some sightseeing and then some caching seeing as it will be our last day here. Some of the historic sites we saw first that we had missed before were:

The Bexar County Courthouse is the largest and oldest continuously operated historic courthouse in Texas. Designed in the distinctive Romanesque Revival style by renowned architect, James Riely Gordon, its cornerstone was laid in 1892 and the grand Courthouse was completed in 1897. A masterpiece of native Texan granite and red sandstone, roofed in distinctive green and red tiles. It was the fifth seat of government in Bexar County, the first four having been ruled by a succession of governments and political entities including Spain, Mexico, The Republic of Texas, The Confederate States of America, and the United States. Each of the four predecessor buildings were located within two blocks of the existing historic courthouse, in the heart of downtown San Antonio.
Since its creation as a part of New Spain, Bexar County has been under the political rule of several countries. These layers of historical change have been reflected in the architecture of Bexar County's courthouse. Since 1897, the Courthouse has had four major additions. The first occurred in 1914 and the second was an extensive remodeling and expansion in 1927. Those additions were sufficient to meet the County's space needs until 1963 when an additional 9,000 square feet were added. Finally, the addition built in 1972 added almost 39,000 square feet at the southwest corner of the building. Presently, the total square footage of the Bexar County Courthouse is approximately 300,000. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977.

Casa Navarro is nestled in downtown San Antonio. The half-acre site is the restored home of Texas patriot José Antonio Navarro (1795 - 1871). Today, visitors can tour Navarro's adobe home furnished with period antiques, read copies of his writing, and discuss questions of history with informed interpreters. The original house complex consists of three limestone, caliche block, and adobe structures, built about 1848. Casa Navarro is the only historic site in San Antonio dedicated to the interpretation of the Mexican history and heritage of Texas, as seen through the life of Navarro, a prominent San Antonio merchant, rancher and statesman.

San Antonio's Vietnam Veterans Memorial which depicts a radio operator comforting a wounded comrade while anxiously searching the sky for a medivac helicopter. The bronze sculpture stands about 10 feet tall at its highest point and is 23 feet long and 12 feet wide. With a weight of more than 10 tons, it is the largest sculpture of its kind in the country. "Hill 881 South," as the memorial is officially called, was created by Scottsdale, Ariz., artist Austin Deuel who served as a Marine illustrator during the war. On April 30, 1967, the dramatic sight of radioman Donald Hassock helping an injured soldier inspired Deuel to draw the picture that 19 years later would become the model for San Antonio's memorial. We also saw the Korean War Memorial in the same plaza.
This is what is inscribed on the front of the sculpture's base:
"Permanently encased within the memorial is an air tight compartment that contains a complete list of the names, serial numbers, branches of the military and dates of service of the men and women from the San Antonio area who served in the Vietnam War. Over 60,000 fine young Americans from our community served in Vietnam. This memorial is a tribute to all of them."
On the other side of the base is a poem titled "Death at My Door":

Day is over and danger hastens
Young Marines at their battle stations
Instruments of war outline the sky
Means of death are standing by
Can it be true on this high hill
Forces will clash only to kill?
Silence fills the near moonless night
Restless thoughts of a bloody fight
Endless memories for those awake
Meaningful discussions experience would make
Though silent world in which we live
Permit only God's comfort to give
Somewhere through the darkness creeping
A date with death is in the keeping
Alone I sit and question why
Life itself to be born to merely die?

San Pedro Springs Park—San Antonio’s oldest designated park— is located on land reserved for public use by the Spanish government in the 18th century. Only one public park in America is older— Boston Common, which dates to 1630.
People have gathered around the springs and creek that originate here for some 12,000 years. Hunter-gatherers found water, food, and rock to fashion weapons, and Spanish explorers first established their camps here in the late 17th century. In 1709, Fathers Antonio de San Buenaventura de Olivares and Isidro Felix de Espinosa named the waters "San Pedro springs." Historians agree that San Antonio’s earliest permanent settlement, a presidio and mission, were founded in 1718 near San Pedro springs, though its exact location is unproven. When the settlement was moved farther south in the 1720s, the springs continued to provide water to the new community. In 1731-34, the Spanish constructed an acequia to carry water to town for irrigation and household use.
The springs, surrounded by spreading trees, were a virtual oasis for residents and a popular recreational destination. In 1852, the City Council officially established a reserve around the springs and then leased the area to John Jacob Duerler who built pavilions where visitors enjoyed food, drink and entertainment. In 1856, the United States Army, experimenting with the use of camels, temporarily stabled the animals in San Pedro Springs Park. Sam Houston spoke to a political rally here in 1860, and during the Civil War, prisoners were held in the park.
These intense uses damaged the springs and park, and in 1863, the City Council prohibited military encampments and livestock in the reserve. J.J. Duerler agreed to fence the park, plant trees and shrubs, and clean the springs. He created five fish ponds west of the lake, planted a flower garden, and constructed a speakers’ stand and exhibition building with ballroom and bar. Duerler also built a race track on the site of today’s baseball field, and opened a small zoo. When Duerler died in 1874, his son-in-law was unable to maintain the park to the City’s satisfaction. It was then leased to Frederick Kerbel from 1883 until 1890 when the City assumed its management. Like Duerler, Kerbel greatly improved the park, installing fencing, planting trees, and maintaining the lake, ponds, and springs. In 1885, Gustave Jermy, a Hungarian naturalist, opened the Museum of Natural History, a forerunner of today’s Witte Museum.
Park conditions deteriorated in the 1890s as spring flow dwindled after San Antonio’s first artesian wells were drilled. This problem was compounded by a nationwide depression that left the City little money to maintain the park. However, in 1897, Mayor Bryan Callaghan was elected for a second term and took a great interest in the park’s renovation. The lake was cleaned and its stone walls repaired, the stagnant ponds were filled in, the old pavilion was demolished, and a new bandstand was constructed. Grass, tropical plants, caladium, and water lilies were added, and driveways and a boat landing were built. The "beautiful, rejuvenated San Pedro Springs" formally re-opened on August 11, 1899. Early 20th century postcards illustrate the formal landscape of San Pedro Springs Park including bridges, benches, planting beds, stone-lined pathways, and the lake inhabited by swans and ducks.

The Pearl Brewing Company (also known as the Pearl Brewery or just Pearl) was an American brewery, established in 1883 in San Antonio, Texas. In 1985, Pearl's parent company purchased the Pabst Brewing Company and assumed the Pabst name. In 1999, the Pabst Brewing Company began transferring its production to Miller Brewing, on a contract basis, and closing all of its breweries. Pearl beer is still in production at Miller's Ft. Worth, Texas facility, but the Pearl Brewery in San Antonio was closed in 2001. Since then, the former brewery was purchased by Silver Ventures, Inc., which has made the property the crown jewel in revitalization efforts of northern downtown San Antonio. If you would like to read the whole, and I mean whole story of the Pearl Brewery you can find it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pearl_Brewing_Company.

The Belgian Transit of Venus Historical Marker in San Antonio, Texas was a rather unlikely location for an international astronomical expedition from Belgium undertaken to observe the Transit of Venus on December 6, 1882. This expedition was led by the Belgian astronomer Jean Charles Houzeau of the Royal Observatory. He had lived in San Antonio for many years before returning to Belgium and was familiar with it as a potential observing spot. Two Belgian expeditions observed the Venus transit of 1882, the first went to Chile, the second to San Antonio, Texas, to observe the transit from both southern and northern hemisphere sites, in order to find the parallactic displacement of Venus on the solar disk. Both parties were equipped with identical instruments, so-called "heliometers with unequal objectives". This special arrangement, invented by Jean-Charles Houzeau, director of the Brussels Royal Observatory, consists of two semi-circle-shaped lenses of different diameters and focal lengths, which could be moved relative to each other by a micrometer. They produced a large and a small image of the sun, plus a large and a small image of Venus. The trick was to shift the two lenses of such a heliometer so that the small image of the sun, produced by the short-focus lens, coincided with the dark large image of Venus projected on the very large image of the sun, and to read the heliometer setting.

Bullis House Inn is a registered Texas State Historic Landmark located in the Government Hill Historic District, the Bullis House was built between 1906 - 1909 by noted architect Harvey Page for General John Lapham Bullis and his family. More concerned with creature comforts when he retired, the general had oak paneling, parquet floors, crystal chandeliers, and marble fireplaces installed in his home.
General Bullis, a New York native, came to Texas in 1865 after four years of service in the Union Army during the American Civil War. He became famous, however, while fighting hostile Indians on the Texas frontier from 1867 - 1882 and was instrumental in the capture of Apache Chief Geronimo.
Constructed in 1870, the Quadrangle, with its impressive clock tower, was originally built as a supply depot. In 1886, it served as prison grounds for Apache Chief Geronimo and his warriors.
Much to the delight of children and adults alike, the Quadrangle now houses flocks of deer, rabbits, chickens, geese and ducks, which have occupied the grounds for over 100 years. The animals are tame enough to hand-feed and occasionally pet.
There is a legend that the Indian chief's spirit roams within the mansion. In later years General Bullis saw service in Cuba and the Philippines, and later retired to his beloved San Antonio.
In 1983, the Bullis House was purchased by the Cross family for use as a bed & breakfast inn.


San Fernando Cathedral. San Fernando began March 9, 1731 when fifteen families of fifty-five settlers arrived from the Canary Islands at the Presidio of San Antonio and were welcomed by Captain Juan Antonio de Almazan in the name of King Phillip V of Spain. Their arrival was a result of a recommendation of the Council of the Indies that a permanent civil settlement in the remote territory of Texas be established to prevent possible incursion of the French. Thus began "La Villa de San Fernando."
The cornerstone of the church building in the new village was laid in 1738, making it the first parish church in Texas. The patronesses of the church were those of the settlers and soldiers in the area: Nuestra Senora de la Candelaria (Our Lady of Candlemas), a patroness of the Canary Islands, and Nuestra Senora de Guadalupe (Our Lady of Guadalupe), the patroness of what would later become Mexico. The church was completed in 1749 and the original walls still stand today forming what is now the sanctuary (the area around and behind the altar) of the present church. These walls are the oldest standing structure in the State of Texas. The dome of the original church was the geographic center of the city and the point from which all mileage was calculated to San Antonio.
In 1793, the Alamo, Mission San Antonio de Valero, was secularized and closed as a church. Its' people became members of San Fernando. The total population at the time was just over 1,000. The next year the other four missions in the area, San Jose, Concepcion, Espada, and Capistrano were also secularized and their lands divided among the Indians. In 1824 Missions Concepcion, San Jose, and Espada were made a part of the San Fernando parish.
Zebulon Pike visited San Fernando in 1808 as he was leading the exploration of the lands of the Louisiana Purchase. During the 1810 - 1820 War for Mexican Independence several battles occured in San Antonio and many of the fallen soldiers were buried at the church. In 1822, the pastor of the parish, Father Refugio de la Garza, was sent as a delegate to the first Congress of Mexico. James Bowie married Ursula de Veramendi at San Fernando in 1831. The Battle of the Alamo in 1836 began after Mexican General Santa Ana raised the flag of "no quarter" from the tower of the church. In the back of the cathedral today there is a sarcophagus or marble coffin on which is inscribed a notice that the remains of the defenders of the Alamo are buried there. Colonel Juan Seguin, who took control of San Antonio after Texas won independence, was purported to have buried the remains under the sanctuary railing of the old church. In 1936, during renovation work, a box of charred bones, nails, and shreds of uniforms was unearthed at that spot. Historians have argued since then about the validity of the claim, but the marble coffin with the remains has been visited by thousands of people since that time.
The cornerstone of the new addition to San Fernando was laid in 1868. The eastern wall, including the original tower, the front of the church, the choir loft and baptistry were torn down to make room for the French Gothic building which is now the main body of the church. This work was completed in 1873 in preparation for the naming of San Antonio as a diocese by Pope Pius IX in 1874 with San Fernando as its' cathedral.


King William National Historic District. The King William area was originally farmland, irrigated by acequias flowing from the San Antonio River, owned by the 1718 Mission San Antonio de Valero. By the beginning of the 19th century, the missions were fully secularized, and the land belonging to Mission Concepcion was bought, sold, and divided into tracts by land speculators, beginning in the 1840’s.
One of the earliest to settle was Carl Guenther, a German immigrant who built Pioneer Flour mill on the lower bend of the San Antonio River. A number of other successful and influential German immigrants discovered the area and began building mansions, using Greek Revival, Victorian, and Italiante architectural styles. Ernst Altgelt, the first to build on current-day King William Street, is credited with naming his street after King Wilhelm I of Prussia.
In later years, the neighborhood fell into decline. In the 1960s, creative young professionals rediscovered the King William area and began a renaissance, which continues to this day.
Supposedly there are no cars allowed in this area but we drove down a few of the streets and weren't stopped although we did see some security guards in different places.


That was it for the sightseeing so then we started a few caches in the downtown area. We ended up doing 8 caches of which 6 were the NRV traditional type and 2 virtuals. The virtuals were in San Pedro Park and the other in an unnamed park which wa sprivate and all we had to do is look through the fence to get some information. Then we headed back to the coach for the rest of the day. Well until tomorrow from Fredericksburg, TX we will sign off and we love and miss you all. Mom & Dad Dori & Dick