Texas Independence Trail Region

08/02/2025

Visit Texas' Lighthouse! Bolivar Point Lighthouse - Aug. 3

07/24/2025

BIG Perseid Meteor Shower now through mid-August! LOOK UP & get out in those dark Texas skies! to Quasars

07/22/2025

Still remnants of great craftsmanship! The Wilson Pottery!

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07/22/2025

Texas history is alive with stories of adventure, shipwrecks, but most of all… humanity. The Karankawa people SAVED the shipwrecked Spanish explorers.

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In November of 1528, a handful of starving Spaniards crawled out of the surf and onto the coastline of what is now Texas. They were gaunt, broken, and barely clinging to life. Their expedition had started with grand dreams of conquest, but the Gulf of Mexico had other plans. Storms ripped their ships apart. Most of their crew drowned. The rest were scattered, lost, or dead.

What staggered ashore that day was no mighty force of explorers. It was a wreck. Half-naked, sunburnt men, ribs showing, eyes hollow. And when they saw figures approaching through the brush, they braced for the worst.

But death didn’t come.

The people who found them were likely the Karankawa. Fierce, yes. Known for surviving on this unforgiving coastal land. But instead of finishing the job the sea had started, they did something else. They wept.

Then they fed the strangers.

That first moment was not a one-time gesture. The Karankawa took these strangers in, gave them shelter, and nursed them through winter. The Spanish were in no shape to offer anything in return. No trade, no gifts, no diplomacy. Just need.

The man who would later write it all down was Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca. He had been part of a 600-man expedition that ended in disaster. Now, he was a guest of people he had been taught to fear. He would spend the next eight years living among various Indigenous groups, passing through what is now Texas, New Mexico, and northern Mexico, adapting to their ways, learning their languages, and depending on their generosity to survive.

His account, La Relación, was one of the first written descriptions of Native American life in the region. And it didn’t read like a conqueror’s tale. It was the story of a man humbled by loss, by the land, and by the people who saved him.

It’s often confused with the story of the Pilgrims, but this happened nearly a hundred years earlier. There were no neat harvest feasts or tidy alliances. Just survival. And a clear record that the first chapter of European presence in that part of North America wasn’t built on domination. It was built on a group of shipwrecked men, lying in the sand, and the strangers who chose not to let them die.

07/18/2025

P*e Wee’s red bicycle is coming BACK to !!!

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07/17/2025

Happy Thursday!!!! Why should hump day have all the fun?!?!🤩

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Can Kicheko come over and stare at you like this for a while?

07/16/2025

Have you joined in for @ ? Just a bit ‘o fun at the fort!

We’re all set up and rolling today in the large barracks room for our Period Luggage and Travel program! Visitors are welcome until 4pm today! We’ll show you some great original and reproduction artifacts and then work with you to pack a bag of modern equivalents!

07/16/2025

Love Texas heritage & culture? The is hiring! (Whole east side of Texas!)

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The Texas Forest Trail Region is looking for an energetic Executive Director! The position is remote, but you must live in or be willing to relocate to one of the counties listed here:

Angelina • Anderson • Bowie • Camp • Cass • Cherokee • Gregg • Franklin • Hardin • Harrison • Henderson • Houston • Jasper • Jefferson • Marion • Montgomery • Morris • Nacogdoches • Newton • Orange • Panola • Polk • Red River • Rusk • Sabine • San Augustine • San Jacinto • Shelby • Smith • Titus • Trinity • Tyler • Upshur • Walker • Wood

The Forest Trail Region works to increase tourism, promote historic preservation, and support community and economic development within a 35-county area in East Texas, from the Oklahoma-Arkansas border to the Gulf of Mexico.

Successful candidates should have an entrepreneurial spirit, non-profit management experience, social media, event planning and marketing experience, be effective in leading board members and volunteers, and be willing to travel.

For additional information including how to apply, go to https://lnkd.in/g2MEHjiA

The regional Executive Director is an employee of the Texas Forest Trail Region Board of Directors.

Cover letters, resumes and applications will be accepted through August 11th or until the position is filled.