Our state is big, it’s wide, and it’s weird. Put those things together and you have a list of some amazing things about Texas.
- Beaumont to El Paso: 742 miles, Beaumont to Chicago: 770 miles
- El Paso is closer to California than to Dallas
- World’s first rodeo was in Pecos, July 4, 1883.
- The Heisman Trophy was named after John William Heisman who was the first full-time coach at Rice University in Houston.
- Brazoria County has more species of birds than any other area in North America.
- Aransas Wildlife Refuge is the winter home of North America’s only remaining flock of whooping cranes.
- The worst natural disaster in U.S. history was in 1900, caused by a hurricane, in which over 8,000 lives were lost on Galveston Island
- The first word spoken from the moon, July 20, 1969, was “Houston…”
- King Ranch in South Texas is larger than Rhode Island.
- Tropical Storm Claudette brought a U.S. rainfall record of 43″ in 24 hours in and around Alvin in July of 1979.
- A Live Oak tree near Fulton is estimated to be 1500 years old.
- Caddo Lake is the only natural lake in the state.
- Dr Pepper was invented in Waco in 1885. There is no period in Dr Pepper.
- Dublin, TX has the oldest and only Dr Pepper bottling company that is still working and producing the original Dr Pepper.
- Texas has had six capital cities: Washington-on-the Brazos, Harrisburg, Galveston, Velasco, West Columbia and Austin
- The Capitol Dome in Austin is the only dome in the U.S. which is taller than the Capitol Building in Washington DC (by 7 feet).
- The name “Texas” comes from the Hasini Indian word “tejas” meaning friends. Tejas is not Spanish for Texas .
- The State Mascot is the Armadillo (an interesting bit of trivia about the armadillo is they always have four babies. They have one egg, which splits into four, and they either have four males or four females.).
- The first domed stadium in the U.S. was the Astrodome in Houston
- Texas is the only state to have the flags of 6 different nations fly over it. They are: Spain, France, Mexico, Republic of Texas, Confederate States, and the United States.
- More wool comes from the state of Texas than any other state in the United States.
- Texas boasts the nation’s largest herd of whitetail deer.
- The first suspension bridge in the United States was the Waco Bridge. Built in 1870 and still in use today as a pedestrian crossing of the Brazos River.
- In 1836 five sites served as temporary capitals of Texas: Washington-on-the-Brazos: Harrisburg: Galveston: Velasco: and Columbia. Sam Houston moved the capital to Houston in 1837. In 1839 the capital was moved to the new town of Austin.
- Texas’ largest county is Brewster with 6,208 square miles.
- Texas possesses three of the top ten most populous cities in the United States: Houston, Dallas, and San Antonio.
- El Paso is closer to Needles, California than it is to Dallas.
- Texas includes 267,339 square miles, or 7.4% of the nation’s total area.
- More land is farmed in Texas than in any other state.
- The state’s cattle population is estimated to be near 16 million.
- More species of bats live in Texas than in any other part of the United States.
- Laredo is the world’s largest inland port.
- The Tyler Municipal Rose Garden is the world’s largest rose garden. It contains 38,000 rose bushes representing 500 varieties of roses set in a 22-acre garden.
- Amarillo has the world’s largest helium well.
- The San Jacinto Monument in LaPorte, TX is listed as the tallest stone column memorial structure in the world, 15 feet taller than the Washington Monument in Washington, D.C.
