Old
News Gleaned from the Brenham Banner-Press
The time was 1936.
The place was Brenham Texas.
Sauerkraut was .11 per can and potatoes were 1.70 for 100 lbs. A quart of oysters
was .60 and crabmeat was .40 per lb. Shrimp was .18 per lb. and you could sweep
the mess out the back door with a Brenham made broom for .25. You could enter
or leave Brenham on a Bee-Line bus with the tickets available from the lobby of
the Saint Anthony Hotel. If
you were headed to San Antonio, the Crockett Hotel would put you up for 1.50 per
night and that included a private bath. Their ad touted "comfortable rooms"
with "sleep inspiring beds". The
Light Crust Doughboys were to appear at Fireman's Park ("Pass the Fire Extinguishers,
Pappy") and Falstaff and Grand Prize both made a "heavy Winter Beer". The
distributor for Grand Prize beer explained what they advertised as "winter
warmth": "Winter
warmth, he said, in a few moments after consumption will develop the effect
of a tingling glow in one's system which creates a desirable warmth". He
went on to say: Bock "as most people know", is a tonic and consumed
only during the spring. "Honey, it's spring. I'm going to go have
a few "tonics" with the boys." This
was the era of self-improvement and half-truths and quasi science was better than
no truth and real science. Professor J. Harvey Black at Baylor University at Dallas
stated that "children with hay fever are more intelligent than children
not so afflicted". The local tire distributor was quoted as saying "new
tires wear longer if broken in during the winter". Editors
note: Please don't write telling me this is true. I don't care. A
bold headline under "Local News" caught our attention: "BRENHAM
MAN HOOKS 50 LB. YELLOW CAT". This event occurred at the
Navasota River Lock and Dam. We'll assume this was a finned creature and not feline.
It may have happened at the Navasota Lock and Dam, but I'm sure the size increased
when the story was told at the Navasota Bar and Grill. In distant Bryan: Mr. August
Straub called his cows one morning and when they came to him, a three year old
Buffalo cow was mixed in with the herd. Unfortunately the cow charged a horse
and broke it's neck before it was able to answer any questions as to her origins.
In the same issue there was a story about a Buffalo "Ghost Herd" which
was spotted back in 1894 and was pursued by agents of the "Texas Game, Fish,
and Oyster Commission". They lost the herd when the trail disappeared into
Mexico from Val Verde County. Starting
with the next installment of OLD NEWS, we'll
celebrate the turn of the century with our newspaper amusements coming from papers
printed during the last days of the 19th Century.
See Brenham,
Texas
Book
Your Hotel Here & Save
Brenham Hotels
> | 
