The Menger Hotel

There are many exciting and extravagant tourist attractions in San Antonio, Texas. There is the Tower of the Americas, The San Antonio River walk, The Alamo, but not one of these famous landmarks are as interesting and mysterious as The Historic Menger Hotel. The Menger Hotel is located on Alamo Plaza adjacent to both The Alamo and River center Mall. I find the Menger Hotel to be very interesting and mysterious because of its history. The hotel was constructed in 1859 under direction of owner William A. Menger and architect John Fries. William A. Menger hired John Fries to design the two-story cut-stone building, which featured an abundance of classical detail. The Menger Hotel opened February 1, 1859, built in the same location that The Menger Brewery had once been operated. The Menger Brewery was said to be one of the first breweries in Texas. The Hotel opened as a two story building and was expanded to five stories and now 316 rooms. The Menger Hotel added a whole new Ballroom Area in 1988. The Menger Hotel was once said to be “the finest hotel west of the Mississippi River.”
Being 150 years old, The Menger Hotel has been visited by all kinds of people from all over the world. The hotel has been host to many prominent and famous guests throughout its long history. Theodore Roosevelt, Oscar Wilde, Babe Ruth, General Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee are just a few of the notables. Among those visitors are those of the past that never seem to checkout, ghostly entities as one might call them. The Menger Hotel is said to be home to several tenant ghostly entities.

For instance, the most often cited entity is a woman named Sallie White. Sallie White was a chambermaid at The Menger Hotel. One night, as the story goes, she stayed overnight at the hotel after an argument with her husband. She may well have stayed at the hotel with another man. The next day, her husband threatened to kill her. She was later attacked by that same husband in March of 1876 and died two days later. According to the hotel ledger, the hotel paid the funeral cost of $32. According to legend, Sallie White still roams the halls of the hotel's Victorian wing. One man had an encounter with a rude maid. He described the maid who ignored him, to the front desk. The uniform he described the maid wearing was from the late 1800's, which was when Sallie worked at the hotel. She is described as wearing an old long gray skirt and a bandanna around her forehead. She is usually carrying towels, which she never delivers.
One reported encounter sent chills down the back of my neck just reading about it. The report states “a guest of the hotel that stayed near rooms 2005 thru 2008 reported to staff that she had heard the sounds of a woman moaning in agony near the stairway area. The moaning went on for almost 30 minutes, then ceased. The area that this was heard in was the exact spot were Sallie White; the former hotel maid was murdered by her husband in 1876.”
Another popular story is about an American President. President Teddy Roosevelt recruited cowboys for the Rough Riders at the Menger Bar on more than one occasion. Over the years people have reported seen him sipping on a drink at the bar. Teddy Roosevelt is the most famous entity seeing at the Menger Hotel.
Another apparition that is often reported is that of Captain Richard King, one time owner one of the largest ranches in the world – The King Ranch. A frequent visitor to the Menger Hotel during his lifetime, he had a personal suite within the hotel. When he learned of his impending death from his personal physicians, Captain King spent the last months of his life, wrote his will disposing of his great wealth, and expressing farewell to his friends in his suite at the Menger. On April 15, 1885, King’s funeral was held in the Menger’s parlor. Today, the room in which he stayed is called the “King Ranch Room.” He is often seen entering his old room, going right through the wall where the door was once located before it was remodeled.
According to staff a ghostly spirit of a woman is often spotted sitting in the original lobby of the historic hotel. Wearing an old fashioned blue dress, small wire-framed glasses, and a tasseled beret in her hair, she sits quietly knitting. On one occasion a staff member stopped to ask her, "Are you comfortable...may I get you something?", only to be answered with an unfriendly “No” before the woman disappeared. Other entities have been known to “help” in the kitchen area, as various utensils have floated through the air seemingly all by themselves. Utensils are often seen transporting themselves from one area to another without help of human hands.
There are very many ghostly entities that guests claim to have seen over the past 150 years and regularly visited by 32 diverse ghostly entities, which can be seen in all areas of the hotel. The ghosts range from Sallie White, of the housekeeping staff, to Teddy Roosevelt himself. There's a ghost for nearly each era, including a Spaniard, a Confederate Officer, and a man in buckskin and one in a top hat.
The Menger Hotel is registered as a National Historic Hotel and perhaps one of the best for a supernatural encounter. Although much of the architecture, history, appointments, and artifacts found at the Menger Hotel certainly qualify as museum-quality, it remains a public hotel - as it has been since 23 years after the fall of the Alamo. The Menger Hotel continues to operate today and is the oldest continually operated hotel west of the Mississippi. I’ve never been inside the Menger Hotel, I am too frightened by all the reports and encounters I read about during my research, but I do recommend visiting The Menger Hotel to those people which have a interest in the mysterious and supernatural encounters.

Music

Toccata and Fugue in D Minor.

I’ve heard this piece before in the old movie “Dracula” and also in “Phantom of the Opera”. The mood this piece creates is frightening and eerie. Listening to it gives me chills and sets a very mysterious mood. This music sounds like if it came out of a horror film. The beginning of the piece seems very difficult to perform but is nicely executed by the musician.

Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring.

I’m pretty familiar with this piece. I’ve heard this piece at church after mass. I also remember this piece from watching movies with church scenes in them. The instruments involved in the melody are an organ and a trumpet. The mood this piece creates is happy, gentle and in some ways calming to the soul.

Brandenburg Concert No.2.

The instruments involved in playing the individual melodies are flute, violin, harpsichord recorder, cello, base, trumpet, and an oboe. Counterpoint plays an important role in the development of this piece because the relationships between two or more rhythms are harmonically independent.

I Love Lucy-Latin Playerz

The instruments being played in this piece are tenor sax, trumpet, drum set, congas drums, bass guitar, piano, and a trombone. This performance is constructed by The Jazz Cycle. This is when all the musicians being on the same page at the start of the piece. Then the sax starts to improvise and it harmonically blends. Then the trumpet begins to improvise, after everyone improvises, they start the melody over again.

San Antonio Museum of Art

I recently visited The San Antonio Museum of Art. The Museum contained many extravagant works of art including sculptures, Asian Artifacts, American Paintings as well as Antique Silver Collections. I am a big fan of Paintings. I enjoy looking at canvas paintings, weather its pastel or oil paints on canvas, they are just beautiful to look at. A couple minutes in to the tour I became quite impatient. I had already gone through three exhibits and had not come across one painting. It was not until I walked down to the other end of the Museum where I saw so many breathtaking paintings. There were portraits, paintings of everyday life, fantasy, and even ink jet printed pieces. Looking at all the wonderful art works it was difficult to try and choose only two of all my favorites. The two pieces I chose were Dark Heart (Candy Tray Series) by Chuck Ramirez and Flesh to Earth by Lloyd Walsh. The Dark Heart is an ink jet printed piece. I noticed the ink right away; it was not colorful like a painting. It was plainly printed in black and white. The print was the inside of a large, Hershey’s chocolate heart shaped box. The interesting thing about this print was that the sections where the chocolates belong were empty. The plain colors gave me a sense of possible sadness or feelings of the end of something. That interpretation of the print is sort of dull, but if you look at the print you will not get a sense of happiness or excitement. Usually, prints like these or all artwork in general, make the viewer wonder or raise questions pertaining to the story or dialogue behind it. I wonder “Who ate the chocolates?” “For what occasion were they given for?” “Was it Valentines Day or an anniversary perhaps?” These are questions that I will not receive answers for but it is always nice to wonder and put your mind to think. I assume that not knowing the background on the print draws me more to it and find it more interesting than others. The second piece I chose was oil on canvas painting. It was Flesh to Earth by Lloyd Walsh. Like the first piece this one was also in black and white with many shades of grays for shadow and contrast. The presentation of this piece was unique. It consisted of one medium sized canvas with a large rose painted on it. Alongside of it was another medium sized canvas with a woman painted on it. This is called a diptych format used to compare contradictions between the two paintings. The rose, which had once bloomed, was slightly wilted. The woman was naked with her arms folded over her chest. The woman’s expression articulated sorrow and grief. Both of the paintings are symbols of life, but the colors, the expression on the woman’s face, and also the wilting, lifeless pedals of the flower darken the meaning of life. Again, I drew interest towards these paintings because of the mysteriousness of them. I wonder what the artist was thinking when he painted this. “Had he experienced a life changing event which he used this painting to express his inner thoughts and feelings?”

Botanical Gardens

The Bald Cypress Tree

Monarch Butterfly

I visited the Botanical Gardens this morning. It took my boyfriend and I took a while to find the entrance, which in fact was right beneath our noses the whole time. On our way in we grabbed a couple of maps just in case. The maps were color coded in numerical order. Every number represented a large insect that was hidden in the many areas of the gardens. 1: Praying Mantis; 2: Lady Bug; 3: Assassin Bug; 4: Damselfly; 5: Ants; 6: Dragon fly; 7: spider; 8: Grasshopper. Walking the path of the gardens was breath taking. There were so many different plants from The Globe Amarenth whose beautiful shades of pink contrasted with the bright green leaves of The Coco de Mer (double coconut) Tree. The scenery was amazing. All the different ecosystems had there own exhibits. I got a chance to walk the trail of The East Texas Pineywoods. I can honestly say that the environment along the trail left me speechless. I was at a loss of words when I saw the most beautiful tree I have ever seen, The Bald Cypress. It was extremely tall with nicely grown branches that lay horizontally across the stem. The leaves on the branches were brightly colored with a very light green base color which blended well with mixtures of orange and yellow shaded leaves that surrounded them. The orange and yellow are both hues of fire which gave me a sense of warmth as I walked along side them. The very natural and earthy trail formed a wide circle around a large pond. The pond looked smooth and calm except for a couple of white ducks swimming along the banks. In the center of the pond was my number 6 insect on my map. It was a large Dragon Fly floating along in the center of the pond. Overall my visit to The Botanical Gardens was not only great but educational as well.

My Hood

I live on the Southside of Bexar County. I live in a small subdivision named Whispering Winds. Whispering Winds is located outside of Anderson Loop 1604, and just off of Highway 281 South. I live outside the city limits just before a small town named Leming. Whispering Winds is a middle class neighborhood. Most men in my neighborhood work so there are many stay-at-home-moms. I know this because I hear their husbands start the car and unlock their gates early in the morning, they do not return home until about 6:oo p.m. so I’m guessing they work a full-time job.

The houses in my neighborhood are old but nicely maintained. My mom moved to this neighborhood when she was pregnant with her first born, which was 24 years ago. Although many years have passed she has kept up with our house wonderfully. She has always told me stories about how our road was not even paved when she first moved here. Every time someone moves into our neighborhood she tells me how the neighborhood was empty only she and her sisters lived on our road.

The types of families that live in my neighborhood are a variety of young, middle aged, and elderly people. There is a couple who happen to be newlyweds that just moved there. There is a middle aged man who lives across the street from me with a young daughter. My grandparents live next door to me so there is a mixture of ages living in my neighborhood. Most of my neighbors work long hard days some even over night. Just two houses don lives a volunteer fire fighter who works at night, and also a paramedic who lives about two blocks down. This may serve as a great convenience to my family and to the rest of my neighbors someday. My cousin who lives next door is a student teacher at the local elementary school.

There is not anything major in my neighborhood. I live about 10 miles from the Southside High School, which is the high school that I graduated from. My neighborhood has always been pretty quiet, there were not very many houses but now it seems like every couple of months people are moving in. Either they build houses or they buy the land to herd their animals such as horses, sheep, cows and goats.

One of the major weaknesses that I’m not proud of is that there is registered sex offenders located in my neighborhood. I’ve looked up sex offenders in my neighborhood and very many of them popped up. I wrote down their addresses and drove by a few I came to notice that I’ve never seen the people that live there. I rarely see a car or two at these houses it’s really frightening because everyone in my neighborhood know each other pretty well. Another weakness about my neighborhood is that nothings a secret there. Everyone is in everyone’s business there is always those people who watch and gossip about what is going on, those people including my grandmother and her friends. They always know the: who, what, when, and where.

One of the strengths about my neighborhood is how everyone knows everyone, is one of the weaknesses as well. Every day after school and almost everyone weekend, all the kids from the neighborhood including me, get together and play. Sports are a big part of everyone’s lives in my neighborhood. On every block there are at least a couple of kids who play sports for the school and some younger ones who plan to. We play all sports baseball, volleyball, but we love playing basketball. That’s how I met my boyfriend who I’ve been with for three years now. My boyfriend lives just around the corner from me. I met him four years ago by playing basketball in our neighborhood. When I was in high school and played for the school I would play year round everyday for four years. Until I graduated and got a job, I just couldn’t find the time for it anymore.

I work about forty five minutes from where I live. I work at Freeman Decorating with my older brother. My company sets up conventions and expos that take places like the San Antonio Convention Center, the Austin Convention Center, and sometime the Alamo Dome. My job is to keep track of the supplies that are ordered and used at the expos. My brother who is my boss is one of the foremen who make sure I do my job and is in charge of the total set up.

Anywhere I go is going to take me at least thirty minutes to get to accept Palo Alto College which takes me about twenty minutes. At exactly thirty minutes I would be as far as South West Military Drive. Any where further than Military will be longer. All my friends live about fifteen minutes away from me. Most of them live just outside of high way loop 410.

Although, my neighborhood is very far from downtown and is far away from the city lights, I’m more of a country girl and enjoy the landscape and feel of the country side. I love my “hood”.

Nuclear Power

The verdict is in and I vote nay on expanding the South Texas Project (STP). City Public Service Energy (CPS) is going to do a lot more than make grantees to the public, once the final costs are exposed. Costs that will come from the tax payer's pocket aka us, the public. CPS's own customers will really understand the massive amounts if they go through with the nuclear power plant expansion. CPS's customer bills will increase 5% every other year until 2016 where it will be at a 3.7% increase until the year 2018 where it will be at a .07% increase. These percentages were presented by a CPS Energy executive using a slide show to pitch the nuclear power effort. These increases in the customer's bills will eventually add up. CPS Energy estimates $13 billion will be needed to complete the entire project. $206 million has already been spent on planning and permitting alone. Later this October, the city council is expected to vote for an additional $400 million which will enable CPS to stay in the project. What I don't agree on is why should we decide to spend so much money on or towards this project if no one is for sure that its going to solve our energy problems. I haven't hear or read anywhere that CPS energy along with NRG energy investigated other alternatives such as wind, solar or natural gas. Neither one of these listed has been ruled out. So there is no telling what else might meet San Antonio's energy needs of the future. Another reason why I think the people of San Antonio should oppose nuclear power is because the companies are not believable. CPS estimates $13 billion will be the cost of the expansion and NRG estimates the project will cost $10 billion. So who do we believe?Finding funds for this project will be tremendously difficult. CPS's own deputy manager, Steve Bartley says that money could run out by this year or early next year. Eventually, this would mean CPS Energy may come forward this spring and ask the city council for more money. Mayor Julian Castro thinks a 40% ownership is too risky for the city and also thinks lesser ownership would be better for the city. Overall, financing will be very expensive and the project will be difficult to fund. Therefore, I oppose the South Texas Project and I vote NO on the expansion. Money does not grow on trees.
There are many questions that have yet to be answered, questions that should not have to be asked. City Public Service should tell everything there is to be told about the whole expansion so that everyone could be aware of all that is going on, and not have to ask or do the research themselves. The people of San Antonio want to see facts, estimates, and proof that the expansion is worth the time and money spent towards this project. People like me want to know who is going to be constructing the nuclear power plant and are they a trustworthy fair company to conduct business with. I want to know their past employers what their past building jobs were and were they done within budget and on time. I also want to know how CPS and NRG plan to get rid of the nuclear waste that can harm the environment and the people around it. Also, if they have a plan on getting rid of the waste, does it actually work? Has it been done before? These are some of the questions that should be asked and answered.

Nuclear Power

So as we all know City public Service (CPS) Energy has proposed a plan to expand the South Texas Project (STP) Nuclear Plant, located outside Bay City, from two to four nuclear reactors. According to the San Antonio Express News, the big question arising from the community of San Antonio is if there will be enough water in fast-growing, drought-prone South Texas to meet the needs of two more nuclear reactors. Mike Kotara, CPS Energy's Vice President in charge of energy development, said most of those painting nightmare scenarios of the STP's reactors running out of water either do not understand or ignore the plant's plans to guarantee water is available, even during drought.
I have been researching the debate for a couple of days and have not yet figured out which side of the fence I fall on. So far I'm leaning towards being against the expansion because I'd rather save energy than use more. Also, there are not many pros to this issue, as opposed to cons. One of the cons on the expansion is that CPS customer's bills would increase about 5% every other year until 2016 when it would drop to a 3.7% increase then to a .07% increase in 2018, according to a slide show presented by CPS energy executive. CPS Energy owns 40% of the nuclear power plant and would need to invest $5.2 billion in the expansion. Mayor Julian Castro says a 40% ownership is too risky and costly, a lesser ownership stake would be better for the city.

Mission Espada Aqueduct

Last week i took the time to visit the Mission Espada Dam. One of the oldest functioning aqueducts in the United States. The Dam was built by the Native Americans from surrounding farms to serve the missionary lands of Espada but the idea or "blue print" by the Spaniards who brought many technologies of their day to the Indians of South Texas. Some of the technologies include agriculture, roman arches, watermills, herding animals, and also blacksmiths. As soon as I got there the first thing I decided to do was enjoy the scenery. It was so beautiful , "breathtaking"...not the "breathtaking" that would lead one to think it was nice landscaping with multiple flowers blooming, but the kind of "breathtaking" that so wonderful because you were able to see the history of the landscape, so rugged and natural. There was quite a bit of mud and pebbles on the banks of the small stream that ran through the historic dam. There was a few large smooth rocks alongside the stream. The sound of water slightly running over the rocks made a small trickle sound that calmed and relaxed me. This made the experience even more enjoyable for me. This was so weird because i was actually trying to visit the dam and rush to work but when i sat on a rock just to get the feel of the environment it was a sudden stop in time, a mini vaca. so i really took the time to soak that relaxed feeling in. Then I headed towards the marker where a brief history lesson was written. From this information I gathered I learned that the dam was 15 miles long and irrigated 3,500 acres of land. It was built across the San Antonio River. It is the only structure built between 1740-1745. The dam had survived many Indian attacks and floods. The Espada Dam used floodgates to control the amount of water sent to each irrigation. Is was mainly used for the supply of water and the success for agriculture. Also, for bathing, washing, and power for mill wheels. The Dam was one of seven aqueducts used to divert water from the San Antonio River to irrigation ditches for the spanish missions. In 1965 the U.S. Department of Interior Designated Espada Aqueduct as a Registered National Historic Landmark. Today the espada Dam still carries water over creeks to fields near the mission just as it did centuries ago. Espada Aqueduct is a Texas Landmark and serves as a tourist attraction. People from many different places come to visit this Historic Landmark and experience the calming beautiful scenery. So I suggest to you all reading this as well to do the same. Although, i actually arrived late to work, it was well worth my time to stop and enjoy the wonderful experience.

Mission Espada

This past weekend i visited and toured Mission Espada. I have only vsited the mission once before when i was in the 2nd grade. So i really didn't know much about Mission Espada until now. Going there now, i really took this opportunity to actually comprehend and understand the purpose of the mission and how it came to be. As we began the tour i quickly found out that the mission was established in 1731. It was built by the Native Americans of South texas under the direction from the Spaniards. The purpose of the mission was to be used as a church where the Spaniards converted the Native Americans to catholicism. Something i found very interesting was that a couple of years ago there was a power shortage in the chapel that sparked a fire. They later discovered that one of the saints that was ruined in th fire had 12k gold underneath the outerlayer of wood. there was sectional off to the side of the mission that was labeled "The Granary". This was where they kept their melons, chilies, spices, corn, sugar etc. This drew the attention of the other Native Americans around Mission Espada. I pictured sort of a small farmers market. As we walked the grounds of Mission Espada gospel music echoed throughout the mission. This was very soothing and relaxing to me. Overall, visiting Mission Espada was a gret experience for me. I highly recommend others to take the time to visit Mission Espada and learn more about the history of my community...beautiful South Texas.