Dawn Youngblood PhD

https://amazon.com/author/dawnyoungblood

Selected Works

Non-fiction

Fort Worth exudes a vivacious Western spirit founded upon a rich history. In 1849, four years after the Republic of Texas became the 28th state, the Army built a fort to keep native tribes west of the Trinity. That fort grew into a focal stop on the Chisholm Trail and later became the western terminus of the railroad. In World War I, Fort Worth housed one Army and three aircraft training bases, while Fort Worth Stockyards, which became one of the largest in the nation, provided multitudes of horses and mules. From pianos on dirt floors to the Van Cliburn Competition, from the earliest portraits by itinerant French artists to world-class art museums, Fort Worth has always been home to high culture. Groups such as the Woman's Wednesday Club made sure art and libraries stood in the old fort town once more famous for its saloons. No matter the era, and no matter the many reasons, Fort Worth will always be "where the West begins."

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Images of America: Fort Worth

Table of Contents:
Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Acknowledgments List of Donors to the Tarrant County Archives
Introduction: Genesis of Fort Worth
1. From Fort to Fire: 1849–1876 2. 2. From Fire to Fire: 1876–1909 3. 3. From Fire to Flood: 1909–1949 4. From Flood to Fury: 1949–2000 Bibliography

Text sample from Chapter 1:

Early that year, the value of a corner lot might literally double overnight. Then, in the fall of 1873, came news that the railway might not make it after all; the English investor Jay Cooke & Co. had failed. Values declined as rapidly as they had grown, and many houses under construction were left half-finished. The rail reached as far as Eagle Ford, just west of Dallas, and there it was abandoned. Paddock bemoaned the timing: “Had the panic broken thirty days later so that it would have been practicable to have completed the road to Fort Worth before suspending operations, Dallas would have been a good county seat town instead of a thriving city and Fort Worth would today have been a city of a quarter million population.” Paddock said “the grass literally grew in the streets. This was not a metaphor to indicate stagnation, but a doleful fact.” Most of the citizenry of Fort Worth moved to Dallas. One of these, attorney Robert A. Cowart, told the famous tale—in the Dallas Herald article from whence the nickname “Panther City” is derived—of a panther asleep in the streets of Fort Worth. For those who remained in Fort Worth, civic pride only grew, and the city was chartered March 1, 1873.