Red Lodge daily news combined with Carbon County news., 1934-05-02
The Alamo
BY ELMO SCOTT WATSON

~ mEN tpph Ah nOIIdslLCu uSCib us
S'S history come pressing a whole
line of wild West" heroes
whose renown might easily have eclipsed his
yet, In this year 1884 the name and fame of
Davy Crockett still '.goes ahead"
Down in Texas they are getting ready to cele-
brate. two years hence, the centennial of Texan
Independence from Mexico and during that cele-
bration the dominant figure In memory will be,
OF course, Sam Houston, the George Washington
OF the Revolution of 1886 and the first president
OF the Lone Star republic. But there will also be
occasion to Remember the Alamo I" and to re-
call again the names of Its heroic defenders
Bowie and Bonham and Travis and, most of all,
Davy Crockett.
For In the minds of most Americans Davy
Crockett is the apotheosis of the Alamo and he
is second only to Sam Houston as the most men,
orable figure In the fight by Texas for freedom
from Mexico. Why7
Perhaps the best explanation can be found In
the book "Davy Crockett by Constance Rourke,
published recently by Harcourt, Brace and CON-
pany. In the foreword to this volume, the auth
or says:
fWhen a country is young 1t discovers Its
heroes, and these are not always leaders In bat
tie. They may only be men who have had the
adventures others long for. They may show adj
mired traits, or strange ones. They may talk or
laugh In a fashion which others enjoy. Always
stories are told about them.
"Davy Crockett knew Wild life as few have
known IL, and he became the most noted hunter
of his time. Even when he was an obscure back. |
woodsman comlcal tales and high talk could be
heard about him, and his own humor had fame
among the people of his region. When he
emerged from the wilderness and appeared In
the East as congressman, he suddenly seemed
to the popular Imagination all that had been
known or guessed about life In the western
woods or on the western waters. There was
truth In this; even In the most soaring of the
many tall tales about Crockett there was truth.
about no single American figure have 80
many legends clustered. After Crockett's death
whole cycles of legendary tales were told about
him that form q rich o%utfower1ng Of the
American Imagination. :"
In those words is a definite clue to the reason
why the figure of Davy Crockett liz still green
In the memory Of his fellow-Americans though a
hundred years have passed since he stopped
living and laughing his way into the hearts of a
people. The fact that he 'had adventures others
long for" Is not enough to guarantee his immor-
tality. Daniel Boone had those adventures. He
also could "show admired traits" And these,
taken together, were enough to make him the
outstanding symbol OF pioneer life, of the Amer
lean frontier. But Davy Crockett had something
also which Boone had not-that gift of humor
which gave him "fame among the people of his
region'-a fam that soon spread to other re-
gions as well. He was both q teller of tall
tales" and an actor In them. So the legends
began to cluster about his name, for frontier
America loved It's "whoppers." And, for that
matter, because this so-called modern America
x~ ctgll rn uaow 4 ~ 4ha F~1n4g~w rIru~ n a. - l
tional life, 1t still loves them.
Perhaps another reason why this fact-and-
fiction hero, Davy Crockett, Ia still such a vivid
figure In our national consciousness is because
of two words which we associate with him: go
ahead |" We Americans love notices, slogans,
catchwords and all such things. Almost all OF
our popular heroes have tagged to them some
phrase that has become historic. Repeat the
words of that phrase and instantly the figure Of
the man who uttered them rises In the mind Of
the nearer.
SO Davy Crockett, unconsciously perhaps, was
guaranteeing his Immortality when he adopted
as his motto BE always sure you are right, then
20 ahead" 1t was a particularly apt motto for
his time. In Crockett's day America, and partic
ularly the American frontiersman, was "going
ahead" He had but recently surged over the
barrier of the Alleghanies. He was engaged In
the conquest of the great interior basin of North
America, the Mississippi valley. He was already
gazing l~ongingly across the Father of Waters to-
ward the western plains and another huge bar
rier, the Rockies. Lewis and Clark had proved
that that barrier could be scaled, so nothing less
than the Pacific ocean was his ultimate goal.
And he was sure Of his rightness In doing all
this. The mere fact that the original inhabitants
Of all this country, the Indian, opposed him
wasn't enough to change that belief. From that
period of our history dates our Indian policy"
taking the red mans land by any means, fair
or foul. For this was the beginning OF an era Of
treaties made only to be broken and of INDIAN !