Imagining Texas

"In 1829, during one of the most turbulent periods in Texas history, Godwin Brown Cotton established the first permanent press in Texas. The Texas Gazette was a largely promotional press used to communicate Stephen F. Austin's reports of the status of Texas to the Mexican government, to recruit new settlers, and to provide news and entertainment to the people of Texas.". "Nine days after the first shot of the Texas Revolution was fired in October 1835, the "unsinkable" Telegraph and Texas Register went to print. Established with the intention to promote the "accumulation of wealth and consequent aggrandizement of the country," the newspaper quickly became the news source for the events of the revolution.". "Contained in these early newspapers are the images that continue to define our perception of Texas. Author Carol Lea Clark delves into how the settlers, fragmented, independent, competitive, and the publishers of the newspapers "wrote Texas" into existence. Read the original "tall tales", accounts of life on the "highly favored ... earth, where the God of nature has scattered choicest blessings," as well as news of the surrender of the Spanish army in Mexico and the seeds of the revolution through the introduction of Mexican troops into Texas." "This is the birth of mythic Texas."--BOOK JACKET.