History of Texas Museum and State Capitol, Austin Texas

Thursday, April 16, 2015

Becky, Bob and I went to Austin for the day where we visited the Bob Bullock History of Texas Museum and the State Capitol. Many pictures of La Salle’s ship “La Belle” and other exhibits in the museum.

In 1684, Robert Calvelier, Sieur de la Salle with the backing of King Louis XIV, set sail from France with 4 ships, La Belle, Le Jolie, L'Amiable and Le Saint- Francois. On board these ships were 100 crew with 300 men, women and children, hopeful settlers of a new and lucrative colony at the mouth of the Mississippi River, The king also charged La Salle with a secret mission; to find Spanish silver mines in Mexico to be later captured for France. The voyage with rife with various mishaps and misadventures. La Belle sank in 1686 and lay buried in the murky waters of Texas' Matagorda Bay for nearly 300 years.

Many years of searching for La Belle ensued. In 1995, the Texas Historical commission surveyed 39 possible locations. On the first day of diving, nautical archaeologist, Chuck Meide felt the dolphin shaped loops of a cannon's handles. Once the cannon had been raised the divers read the French inscription and suspected they had located La Belle.

Of course, they recovered a thimble from La Belle

There were more than 150 recovered item on display, but they have over a million. This exhibit was very impressive, but in July 2015 when they move into the permanent exhibit hall now under construction it will be worth another visit.

 A man's clog that John felt would have belonged to a labourer

Bar Shot - Sailor would fire an iron bar shot - the halves of a cannon ball joined by a length of rod - from the ship's cannons to destroy sails and rigging of enemy ships

This small (just less than 1") brass emblem represented the Sun King, Louis XIV. It was originally embedded in a wooden gun stock

The middle picture is a scale model showing a cutaway of the cargo hold.
The first and third are the actual pieces of the ship being assembled like a puzzle. Each piece was originally numbered with Roman numerals as it was supposed to have been delivered on a larger ship, Le Joly to be assembled when it reached the Americans. Le Joly was too full.
There were videos playing of the coffer dam and the excavation of the ship.




We walked to the Capitol and we were able to go inside for photos and to see both senate and the House of Representatives, both in session.

The Senate

The House of Representatives

I took a view pictures of the Governor’s mansion  and the University of Texas tower from the car. We stopped for a little shopping near Bee Cave at Chico’s – lovely clothes, but we didn’t buy anything. Not so at Barnes and Noble. Came home to an outstanding dinner of BBQ’s salmon fillet, wild rice and Asian salad. After supper, Becky and I went to Dollar Tree to buy spatulas and witnessed an amazing lightning storm probably south of Austin, about 80 miles away. It went on for about 30 minutes.

We also went to the local cemetery and saw a jacket rabbit, a doe and this unusual gravestone.