This website will be unavailable from Thursday, May 30, 2024 at 6:00 p.m. through Monday, June 3, 2024 at 7:00 a.m. due to data center maintenance.
H.R. No. 855
R E S O L U T I O N
WHEREAS, J. Frank Dobie, a writer and chronicler of the
folklore of Texas and the Southwest, published some 25 books in his
distinguished career, and it is indeed a pleasure to recognize his
important role in Texas literature; and
WHEREAS, Born in 1888 on a ranch in South Texas, Mr. Dobie
earned his bachelor's degree from Southwestern University in
Georgetown, where he also met Bertha McKee, a fellow student who
would become his wife and lifelong companion; after college, he
taught at a high school in Alpine and worked as a newspaper reporter
during the summers, but soon felt a longing to teach poetry at a
more advanced level and enrolled in graduate school at Columbia
University in New York; and
WHEREAS, After pursuing his master's degree at Columbia, Mr.
Dobie returned to Texas and joined the English department at The
University of Texas at Austin; his teaching career was temporarily
interrupted by a stint in the U.S. Army at the end of World War I,
but he returned to UT after his discharge; and
WHEREAS, Remembering the stories of his uncle's vaqueros that
he had enjoyed as a boy, he settled on a scholarly pursuit that
would satisfy his interests both as a writer and as a student of
Texas history; he decided that he would collect and tell the
legendary tales of the Lone Star State much as the famed
musicologist and fellow Texan John Lomax had collected the folk
songs of the South; from that point on, Mr. Dobie actively pursued
the folk legends of the Southwest in his travels, readings, and
writings, and in 1921, he became editor of the Texas Folklore
Society; and
WHEREAS, His book Coronado's Children received national
attention and significantly broadened the writer's audience; while
continuing to teach, he traveled, lectured, published articles and
books, including Apache Gold and Yaqui Silver and The Longhorns,
and began a syndicated newspaper column called "My Texas"; in 1930,
he introduced his course, Life and Literature of the Southwest, and
it soon became the most popular offering on campus; he also enjoyed
a two-year stint as a lecturer on American history in Cambridge,
England; and
WHEREAS, An ardent individualist, Mr. Dobie often spoke out
on social issues and other causes that captured his attention; he
argued against censorship and demagoguery and championed black
voting rights and organized labor's right to strike; his formal
teaching days ended when he resigned from the university in 1947,
but he continued to meet with students and colleagues in informal
literary salons held in the backyard of his home, which was adjacent
to campus; and
WHEREAS, After his death in 1964, his wife saw to the
publication of two books under his name based on his notes; she and
friends also established a most fitting memorial to him with the
Dobie Paisano Fellowship, which provides money for writers and
artists to work on their projects during a six-month stay on Mr.
Dobie's Paisano Ranch in the Texas Hill Country; today, his Austin
residence is home to the Michener Center for Writers, an
interdisciplinary creative writing graduate program at UT; and
WHEREAS, Although more than 40 years have passed since his
death, J. Frank Dobie continues to enhance the lives of countless
readers with the rich legacy of writings that he left behind, and we
may consider ourselves fortunate that he chose to focus his
extraordinary talent on the bountiful stories and traditions of our
state; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives of the 79th Texas
Legislature hereby pay special tribute to the life of J. Frank Dobie
and acknowledge his remarkable contributions to Texas letters.
Gonzalez Toureilles
______________________________
Speaker of the House
I certify that H.R. No. 855 was unanimously adopted by a
rising vote of the House on March 23, 2005.
______________________________
Chief Clerk of the House