View over Waterfall Road :: Wales

Photo by Nicky.lew on flickr...

My home country...Wales...my mother and brother have been back there...tracing the family tree back...pre-dating the 1600's I think...

Then there is a branch that was in Georgia from the late 1700's I'm not sure where in America they were prior to that. No doubt they landed on the east coast and started migrating inland - to better and better farmlands as the frontier advanced inland.

Then after the Civil War, they packed up and moved to Texas.

Another branch of the tree was already in Texas - the paternal side from Tennessee (the folks from Wales, I think), and the matriarchal side from Spain. John Smith (the messenger dude at the Alamo) and Maria de Jesus Curbelo (from Spain) married in San Antonio. After the Texians (as they were called then) defeated Santa Anna's army, and gained their independence from Mexico, John Smith became the first mayor of San Antonio. This lineage makes me a "Son of the Republic of Texas". John Smith is my 7th Great Grandfather.

It's interesting to note that Texas was the only State that was actually its own country - "The Republic of Texas. It was bounded by the Sabine River on the east, the Rio Grande (then named "Rio del Norte") on the west and the Gulf of Mexico on the south. The northern boundaries were the Arkansas River and Red River and it extended as far north as the current state of Wyoming.

Just to get a reaction, when I lived in Aspen, I used to tell people that I was there as an Ambassador of The Republic of Texas, because Aspen was originally part of the Republic. I'm not 100% sure, but I think Aspen was pretty close to the western edge of the territory.

I'm piqued by the way my brain works. I see a photo like this from a new flickr friend, notice it is in Wales, then I get this flood of thoughts and memories.

So, I just roll with it sometimes.

Here is a map of the Republic of Texas...