Category: History of San Antonio

Playspace of Yanaguana Garden bursts into bloom October 2

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A spiraling “Blue Hole” at the center of Oscar Alvarado’s elongated serpentine mosaic bench is one of many features defining a sense of place in the soon-to-be-unveiled Yanaguana Garden at the southeast corner of Hemisfair. The Blue Hole north of Brackenridge Park is the spring feeding the river in the land native Payaya Indians referred to as Yanaguana.

Opening to the public the weekend of October 2, Yanaguana Garden is an admission-free playscape for young and old with water features for splashing, swings of all types, giant chess boards, a bocce court, pingpong tables, benches for sitting, a sandbox for crafting drip castles, “trees” for climbing and actual mature trees for shading. The springy base cushioning the areas under climbing structures is amazingly soft to walk across.

The engaging interactive public art created by a team of San Antonio artists led by Stuart Allen carries out the playful theme, including playhouses, metal puptents by Joey Fauerso, Allen’s how-to-build-a-kite bench, Jen Khoshbin’s stage for plays and a sound installation by Justin Boyd. These touch-me works of art were administered by Public Art San Antonio (PASA) with funds provided by the 2012-2017 bond program.

All of these elements are nestled respectfully among historic homes, remnants of the original neighborhood eliminated by HemisFair ’68. These are being repurposed to weave a portion of the fabric that will form a new neighborhood as Hemisfair continues to evolve.

Design for the playscape fell under the guidance of landscape architect Susan Goltsman, president of MIG. Based in Berkeley, California, the design firm prides itself for building inclusive environments.

For those who are not within walking distance of this new addition to the ‘hood, arrangements have been made for free parking in three large lots on the south side of Cesar Chavez (Charango) Boulevard on opening weekend.

To find out more about contributing to reshape Hemisfair, visit https://www.hemisfairconservancy.org.

Struggling and longing to be ‘fictionalized’

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So can identify with the whining of the main character in “How Shall I Know You,” a short story in Hilary Mantel‘s The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher.

The woman is an author who has been “struggling with a biography” for several years.

As a biographer I was more than usually inefficient in untangling my subject’s accursed genealogy. I mixed up Aunt Virginie with the one who married the Mexican, and spent a whole hour with a churning stomach, thinking that all my dates were wrong and believing that my whole Chapter Two would have to be reworked.

Why, I can out-whine her any day. I have a whole cemetery I’m trying to untangle, and I’m sure I’m at least three years into it. And it is filled with a multitude of Smiths and Joneses and Cokers, many of whom inconsiderately passed down the same first names over and over. The Joneses prove particularly difficult, as they originate from two completely unrelated lines, or unrelated for quite a while before the Texas Revolution and not again until some time later.

And she only spent “a whole hour” thinking everything was awry? That’s nothing.

The author in the short story finds writing the truth, when it has to be uncovered, difficult.

I seemed to be pining for those three short early novels, and their brittle personnel. I felt a wish to be fictionalized.

Making up things does seem much easier than digging up facts long-buried. Often I want to just linger in the tub imagining different lives among all of those Coker descendants. The writer in “How Shall I Know You” does just that. She starts typing up exciting invented versions of the lives of Aunt Virginie and the Mexican, completely avoiding the facts associated with the original subject of the biography.

But, unfortunately, you just can’t make this stuff up.

And, I know I don’t need to.

The Coker Cemetery is fertile with true tales that should be passed on to the descendants of the residents resting there.

I’ve made it through the Texas Revolution, the arrival of German and Hungarian settlers and the Civil War. I’m getting there. Slowly.

Each nugget I discover is rewarding. In addition to the everyday stories of hardworking dairy farmers, there is a surprising bit of murder and mayhem to entertain me.

All I need is patience. And an extremely large dose of it.

the-assassination-of-margaret-thatcherWait a minute. Wolf Hall. Bring Up the Bodies.

The author of the author in the short story is the ultimate award-winning, best-selling researcher.

All whining privileges on my part are hereby revoked.

A shimmering mirage on a simmering summer day….

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parkThe National Park Service turns 99 on August 25 and among the mash-ups created for the occasion is this mélange of Denali National Park and the San Antonio Missions National Historical Park.

As appealing as morphing Mission San Jose into a giant raspa or a baked Alaska in the middle of the summer, “Lincoln Logs,” combining the towering trees of Sequoia National Park with the solemn columns of the Lincoln Memorial, is a stunning image.

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