March 15, 2023 • 25 mins
In this month's episode, editor Adam D. Young joins our agriculture and environmental reporter Brandi D. Addison to discuss the arduous journey of the aoudad sheep, two famous Texas Tech traditions and one of the most photographed roadside attractions in the country, Cadillac Ranch.
Find the Weird West Texas series on our website.
To read individual stories, visit the links below:
Got an idea for a topic? Send an email to BAddison@gannett.com with "Weird West Texas" in the subject line.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
S1 (00:06):
Howdy. My name is Brandi Addison. I'm the regional agriculture
and environmental reporter for the USA Today Network's West Texas region.
And this is weird. West Texas, the podcast. Each month
we'll explore some of the most odd, eccentric and sometimes
just plain weird things in our region. From the state's
northernmost town of Booker down into the big country westward
(00:27):
to the Permian Basin and all the way into the
rolling plains. We're so excited to take you on this
journey to discover our weird but wonderful West Texas. Now
let's get weird, y'all. Today I'm joined by my editor,
Adam Young, who oversees the Lubbock Avalanche Journal and Amarillo
Globe News. Adam, you ready to dive in?
S2 (00:47):
I am. Okay. So far this I think my main
takeaway from these is that all the comments that you're
having me have to vet now because of this this
darn series. So thank you.
S3 (01:01):
Yeah. So I've had a lot of people say that
they're excited to like keep reading though, right? Like and
we have a lot of new readers, new audience members.
So I love that we have, you know, a lot
of people really engaging here with this. So over the
last month, we've researched information about Will Rogers and soaps
head statue at Texas Tech, Cadillac Ranch, Texas Tech's tortilla
(01:24):
toss tradition and the ordered sheet. So I already know
that that was probably your favorite topic, just knowing who
you are. You were really excited to read it, so
let's just go ahead and talk about that. Um, yeah.
S2 (01:40):
I just wasn't familiar with that as a, as a concept.
Shame on me. But you know, I've been here in
Lubbock since 2005 when it came up to Tech, and
I was from Abilene originally, and that just wasn't something
I'd heard about. But so I appreciated learning a little
bit more about a topic that I wasn't somewhat familiar with.
(02:00):
Like I was with the Will Rogers statue or the
tortilla toss. Would you added some nice context to it,
made it a little bit more succinct, but this was
more of a learning experience for me. So, I mean,
how did you track all that information down?
S3 (02:15):
Yeah. So I actually got the idea because I'm in
this Facebook group called Postcards from the Panhandle, and this
woman posted a picture of a herd of sheep. I
linked it in the story through her backyard and Amarillo, like,
not the canyons, just like in town of Amarillo. And
so I decided from there that I was going to
look that up because I thought it was really interesting.
(02:35):
I found some stuff from The Atlantic, and there's also
a website I think called Texas Panhandle Bird Nerd. I
attempted to call a couple professors in the Natural Resources
department at Tech to No luck and also Texas Parks
and Wildlife. But they they didn't have much to say
about the sheep. So a lot of it was just
(02:56):
research their research regarding invasive species and all that stuff.
So going and just to expand on that, if y'all
didn't actually read the story, the ordered sheet basically replaced
the bighorn sheep, which are a native species in the Panhandle, right?
So QGIS in the late 1940s brought them over because
(03:17):
they thought they'd be a game species. Now more than
75,000 roam North America while they're actually a.
S1 (03:22):
Vulnerable species.
S3 (03:23):
In their native land of North Africa. So there's only
between 5000 and 10,000 individuals out there and they're actually
considered vulnerable. So that was interesting to me. And what
was really interesting to me was learning about the idea
of Texas, which Texas Parks and Wildlife wrote about in
a magazine, which is essentially the idea of non native
species that have come to Texas and totally thrived. While
(03:49):
they can't even struggle, you know, they're struggling to survive
in their own native lands abroad. That was really interesting.
And this whole thing has really kind of prompted an
exotic meat industry, which I thought was really interesting.
S2 (04:04):
Stood. I still was trying to get a good sense.
I think and your story mentioned population growth was perhaps
even going to, I guess, incursion of our neighborhoods and
cities into the right because rural areas and that's perhaps
why more people are seeing them.
S3 (04:23):
Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, if you think about it,
they only they released 31 in 1957. So think about
how many we have now. They have definitely expanded, but
so has our human population, right? So now our borders
between wildlife and humans are shrinking because of development, population growth, whatever.
(04:45):
And yeah, now they're making their way over to cities,
as with other wildlife animals, right? You know, now we're
seeing more coyotes, foxes, whatever. Just a common theme among Texas, right?
S2 (05:00):
You mentioned the exotic meat industries. That is that one
that people are utilizing. I've not seen rendered your dad
cheap meat. Yeah. So Market Street or H-E-B?
S3 (05:11):
Yeah. I mean, they have a ranch out in Terlingua
that host these hunts like four day hunts and they're
like 5 to $7000 for these people to do. And
they're already booked out through early 2024. And like dad,
because they're invasive, they actually don't have a set season.
You can go hunt them all year long. So the
fact that they're booked out that far in advance, like
(05:32):
really shows how essential this industry is to some people. Understood.
Definitely interesting. Okay. So I'm going to move on. I
actually did have one email on that and someone said
they found one out at sheep in central Texas. And
that's that's all the email was. So I did see, though,
that they did have one in Uvalde County a couple
(05:54):
of years ago that had disease and they were worried
about it spreading to other local animals.
S2 (06:00):
Yeah. I wonder if they're susceptible to the same diseases
that you see with some of the deer that we
get alerts from Texas Parks and Wildlife on. I didn't
see much of that. Or if they're immune to that
and they have their own unique issues.
S3 (06:14):
Yeah, I think it's like specific within sheep and goats.
You know how the avian flu is specific to birds? Okay.
So I'm going to move forward to Will Rogers and
Soap Suds. So we're both tech grads. Your wife works
at Tech, so we know a lot about Will Rogers
and soap sets. You know, the saddle tramps go and
(06:35):
wrap him every home football game and read. Um, and
so I actually read that. Let's go back with the
history of Will Rogers and Soap Suds. So this was
a gift by Armand Carter, who, if you did not know,
is like one of the Texas Tech's founders. That was
really interesting for me to learn because I'm a Fort
(06:55):
Worth native and you see his name all over Fort Worth,
all over TCU. And when someone told me that he
founded Texas Tech or was one of the founders, I
was I was shocked. I was like honestly shocked. Like
even to learn that the place that Will Rogers statue
sits on is called Americana Plaza. I did not know
that the entire front entrance of university, you know, the
university where the school is is called Carter Plaza.
S4 (07:19):
Which.
S3 (07:19):
I never knew. That was wild to me.
S2 (07:21):
So it's not commonly referred to that. I don't think
a lot of students say, hey, let's meet up at
the Carter Plaza before we walk over to Timmy's.
S3 (07:27):
Exactly. That's wild to me. Like, you know, we know
the name of Memorial Circle. We know the names of
all the little parks within the area, but we did
not know the name of that plaza. I wonder if
it's like our beef with TCU. I don't know. But
it was interesting to me. So actually then editor of
the AJ presented the casting of the statue to Lubbock,
(07:49):
which I did not know. That was really interesting to find. Um,
why was there a Will Rogers statue here? Okay, so
in what I in my research, I learned that, like
Bull Rogers has literally no associations with Texas whatsoever. And
Carter just believed that the statue would fit into the
traditions and scenery of West Texas memorializing Rogers lifetime as
(08:10):
a cowboy legend. And I couldn't think of a better
school in Texas to put a Will Rogers statue. If
we want to talk about cowboy legends, right?
S2 (08:18):
I mean, at the time, he was a cultural icon
across the country. Absolutely. Every community. Yeah, familiar with him,
just a national celebrity.
S3 (08:27):
But yeah, so our Mr. Cowboy culture, Alvin Davis, who
died not too long ago, he actually really got into
the cowboy way of life because he saw Will Rogers
just a couple months before he died. And that's when
he decided he wanted to be a cowboy. So he
has a lot of influence on West Texas, for sure.
So the thing about the sculpture, it was initially positioned
(08:49):
to face Northwest, so it appeared that Will Rogers and
Soap Suds were running into the sunset. Right. It was
even called Going into the Sunset or something like that.
That's the title of it. Um, but Lubbock decided that
the hind end facing east toward downtown Lubbock might insult
the local business economy. So they changed the degree by
(09:11):
23 angles. And now there's this theory that it faces
intentionally towards A&M. We have intentionally placed the hind end
towards A&M because we love to hate A&M. But yeah,
I've kind of.
S2 (09:24):
Heard mixed stories on whether it actually points in that
direction or not. I've not gone over there and like
check the trajectory myself, but it's certainly a nice story
that we embraced back when A&M was still in the
Big 12.
S3 (09:37):
Yeah, Yeah. And you know, so they actually did put
those rumors to rest a decade ago and interviewed Chris Sneed,
who was the vice president of the Alumni Association, and
he refuted that there was any truth behind the story.
He basically said, like, if we're going to be technical,
it's either Waco or Austin that it's facing, which either
way a big 12 school, you know, So that's interesting.
S2 (09:59):
Well, it's a fairly large behind. I mean, it kind
of depends on exactly what part of the behind part
of it. Surely it's got enough trajectory that some of
it's going to hit, uh, you know, College Station. Brian
But yeah, some of it.
S3 (10:14):
The whole yeah, that whole side of Texas. But, you know,
it's all West Texas, so it just hit more West Texas, right? Yeah.
You know, but the most interesting thing I learned about
the Will Rogers stuff was that The Saddle Tramp started
covering it during home football games to protect it because
(10:34):
it was actually painted in maroon after either I can't
remember if A&M one or a tech one. I think
tech one tech beat A&M and it was painted in maroon.
And so they decided at midnight before every home football game,
they would go wrap it in red crepe paper because
they wanted to protect the statue. So I thought that
was an interesting I never heard why that happened. So
(10:55):
I thought that was really interesting. Well, that.
S1 (10:57):
Was one theory.
S3 (10:58):
Another theory was that it just started when people wanted
to went to paint the campus red and they just
hung up red streamers and great paper all over campus.
S2 (11:07):
Yeah, even my whole time there is a student and,
you know, living here in the community, I haven't I
hadn't seen them wrap the statue until this last fall.
I guess it had a homecoming. So it's actually just
a really nice experience to go out there and watch
it and. Yeah, yeah, just some kind of a food
truck atmosphere out there now when they're doing that, so. Oh, okay.
S3 (11:29):
That's cool. I did not know that. Yeah, I went
once during my undergrad, but either way was really interesting
to kind of learn where that tradition came from. Okay,
So Cadillac Ranch, let's talk about Cadillac Ranch. So you
actually knew about the history of Cadillac Ranch, right? I
actually didn't really know about it.
S2 (11:48):
I mean, I knew it was kind of the Stanley
master and his connection to it. A little bit of
controversial thing.
S3 (11:55):
Yeah.
S2 (11:57):
I don't think that defines it, but I think that. No,
absolutely not. Painted a little bit. But I just know
it's been a long time. Kitschy attraction, interactive art for
folks in the Panhandle. I've never swung by it myself.
It's still on my to do list when I go
up there.
S3 (12:15):
Yeah. So it's actually, you know, the ant farm collective.
You saw that they brought that in. Was it the 70s?
It's going to hit its 50th anniversary within next year,
I believe so, yeah. I guess the 70s they decided
to do it. Stanley Marsh commissioned them, but it was
these artists who decided to put it together. Ten Cadillac model,
(12:36):
you know, vintage Cadillac models lined up with their nose
seemingly buried into the ground. Right. And they're at an
angle that's supposed to match the Pyramid of Giza and Egypt,
which I thought was really interesting, of course. I mean it.
The story behind it isn't super interesting, but it's really
(12:57):
interesting to see how much play this art just is
like random piece of art. This random exhibition has gotten
in popular culture. Like Bruce Springsteen had a song, James
Brown did a music video or had lyrics on it. Um.
S2 (13:13):
This sort of Texas travel guide, you're either going to
see that or you're going to see a scene of
Palo Duro Canyon to represent the Panhandle typically.
S3 (13:22):
Yeah, yeah. You know, like, like I had written that
cars had like a little fake car thing in it.
It was in the mountains, right? Because it's cars and
that's like the actual, like, big design that they have,
big installation that they have at the Cars exhibit in
Disney World. Right. So that's really interesting. Um, it's just
been in so many popular culture references, dozens, maybe hundreds,
(13:44):
I don't know, but I know for sure doesn't. So
it's just interesting to see how far that has grown.
It is really interesting to see how people, you know,
at the end of it I put that into this column.
I said something along the lines of this wasn't just
one person's art, like this is now a canvas for everybody, right?
This is an opportunity for everyone to showcase their creativity
(14:05):
or send a message, including the guy who decided to
set it ablaze one night. Right. It's become the face
of social justice activism in recent years, painted in pride,
colors painted in Black Lives Matter. So it's really interesting.
People from all over the world have come to this.
Small exhibit really is small in the grand scheme of
(14:25):
things and literally the middle of nowhere. It's fair to
say Amarillo, it's pretty much in the middle of nowhere
when you think of the entire like that. But yeah,
but if you're coming from another country or if you're
coming from New York or Florida or California, I think
it's safe to say that Amarillo like is not a
spot you would typically go see, you know, like on
(14:47):
its own. Like there are a lot of people who
go there. It gets yeah, it gets visitors.
S2 (14:52):
866 traffic.
S3 (14:54):
Yeah. So it's interesting. It's really weird just to see
how much it has grown like, and then it has
that like little Slug Bug ranch 35 miles west that
that inspired. So it's just, it's really cool to see
how it's just made its impact on the US right?
One of the most photographed roadside attractions in the nation.
S2 (15:17):
Yeah, it's up there with Wall Drug up in South Dakota,
which you perhaps have not seen, and just other kitschy
roadside attractions. The largest ball of yarn, you know, largest handbag. Well,
and then you've got the Cadillac Ranch, which is a
little bit more visual than I think than some of
the others.
S3 (15:35):
Yeah, a little bit more popular than the world's largest
jackrabbit here in Texas. Yeah. Okay. So Cadillac Ranch. Now
let's go into the tortilla toss. I have some emails
to read with this one, so. Oh, boy. So we
talked about this, the tortilla toss. You know, there's there's
(15:56):
two stories that surround this one. The first one is
that tech fans had originally tossed lids to their 44
ounce drinks. And next game, the lids were banned. Right.
So they decided to just grab tortillas because tortillas are
also a popular tailgating food and they're easy to throw. Right.
(16:19):
But there's another one that says that an ESPN announcer
before our Texas A&M game, of course, Texas A&M, we
got to Spike A&M whenever we can.
S2 (16:27):
Apparently they rile up the crowd.
S3 (16:30):
Yes. You know, so so the ESPN announcer said that
there's nothing in Lubbock but Texas Tech football and a
tortilla factory. So then they showed up to the game
and they threw tortillas at kickoff. Now, I don't know
which one is right. Both are amusing theories, but it's
wild because there was actually a tortilla penalty, right, where
(16:52):
Texas Tech would lose 15 yards if there were tortillas
thrown on the game, you know, on the field. But
it never stopped fans because tech fans are rowdy and
they really don't care. You know, how many times have
we got fined for storming the field or court this year? Right.
So it didn't stop anybody. But it was really interesting.
It's just a really interesting thing. Like people have even
(17:14):
learned that if you cut out the holes and, you
know holes in them, that they're going to go further
and they've come up with some really creative ways to
sneak them in, which I think is interesting. I remember
one football player had eaten one and did it on
video and like he went viral on Twitter and was like,
you don't want to want to know how that got here, right?
Like you wouldn't be doing that if you knew.
S2 (17:38):
Yeah, it's certainly a less destructive, I guess, fan habit
than what the student section would do and disassembling the
bleachers and passing those down.
S3 (17:47):
Yeah. Or the field post or whatever.
S2 (17:50):
You are throwing batteries. So yeah, I know the I
say it's seemingly harmless. I know there were quite a
few emails and comment posts that we got on that
story about the potentially racially insensitive origin of that tradition. Right.
(18:13):
And I know that former Avalanche Journal publisher Steve Beasley
had even shared that email with you. Is his theory
or his understanding of how it originated with a former
defensive player, Gabriel Rivera, and it kind of being somewhat
in honor of him. That's perhaps makes me a little
uncomfortable with it. It stems from that it was really
(18:35):
never a a tradition that I embraced when I was
a student there. But I was I was amused when
I saw it happen.
S3 (18:43):
Yeah. So I think that maybe some stories got crossed
because a similar I'm not going to argue whether again,
whether it was racist or not, but I think some
stories got crossed because a similar incident happened in California
a couple years ago and it was at a high
school basketball game. And the entirety of the other team
that they threw tortillas up was Latino. So this high
(19:06):
school basketball team got banned for the remainder of the season.
They lost the game. That coach got fired and they're
still not playing basketball. That's happened in 2021. They cannot
return to games until 2024. So I think that's might
be where some stories got crossed there. And I know
that I think another university in California does it during
(19:27):
track meets. I think that might be where stories got crossed,
but I'm not the one to dictate, you know, what's
racist and what's not. So we'll stem away from that.
But I do want to read some emails, so I've
shared a couple with you. Um, this chief financial officer
at a local diocese actually reached out to me via
Twitter and said that he believes that there might be
(19:49):
a connection between the Romans, which threw flatbread at gladiator games.
So I think that was a really interesting theory. I'd
never heard anyone like go that far back in association.
Do I think that tech fans are well aware of
that history? Probably not. I think tech fans are just
rowdy and probably like to throw things.
S2 (20:09):
Yeah, perhaps some students majoring in the classics would would
be familiar with that story, but I don't know if
that's what inspired them to go ahead and do that.
That one seems like a stretch.
S1 (20:19):
Jim B said.
S5 (20:20):
Tortillas, float beans.
S3 (20:21):
Don't. End of story.
S1 (21:10):
Um, this one was interesting. An archivist at Texas Tech
did confirm that it was probably started from the tortillas
factory comment, but.
S3 (21:20):
She continued.
S1 (21:20):
To say that Bob Barker, who was actually the athletic
director at the time, was the one who pushed for
the ban because apparently he thought it was unseemly for
the tech students to be throwing food. That's her words,
not mine. I thought that was interesting. David said, I
graduated from Tech in May 1989, and my memory was
the previous fallout. One of the home games. The local
(21:41):
grocery store United handed out sampler packs of 2 or
3 of their fresh meat tortillas as a promotion upon
entry to the game. Previous to this game, there had
been several students who began throwing yellow flags in the
air when a penalty was called on the fill. Now,
armed with tortillas, they began throwing them out and it
just continued game after game after that. Now let's head
into some of the more interesting ones. JJ said he
(22:03):
grew up in Lubbock and lived there from 90 or no, sorry,
76 to 93. His father was actually the dean of
Mass Comm and he was a ballboy for the Red
Raiders for multiple sports, but mainly basketball in the early
80 seconds. He said he remembers the day because it
was his mom's birthday. November 9th. No, no, November 19th, 1988.
It was Thanksgiving time and it snowed that week. Tech
(22:24):
was mediocre, his words, not mine. But Houston was stacked
and the quarterback was Andre Ware, a Heisman candidate. The
attendance was low, but there was a lot of snow
in the stadium. On the way into the game, there
was a vendor handing out free batteries, of all things.
During the first half, people put batteries in the snowballs
and started throwing them onto the field. The game was
stopped more than once and the second time Coach Dykes
(22:45):
Spike actually spoke over the PA system to stop throwing
things onto the field. It helped a little, but Houston
completed a comeback and beat tech by one point in
the fourth quarter, which prompted another slew of battery filled snowballs.
After the game. After the game, Coach Dyke said, People
throw stuff all the time, but batteries and snowballs, they
ought to throw something soft like a tortilla. I'm not
(23:07):
sure if it was in the newspaper or anywhere in print,
he said. But the year ended and in the fall
of 1989, his freshman year at Tech, there were a
few tortillas thrown at each game until it became It
is what it is today. I can tell you I've
heard many stories about the tortillas, he said. But this
is definitely the way it happened. That was interesting, and
this one's also really interesting, Carlos says. I'm still amazed
(23:30):
the conversation does not connect to what I remember. As
a long time tech fan. In the early 90s, there
was not as many bowl games and few corporate sponsors.
The games were also aligned with conferences. The Big eight champ,
typically Oklahoma or Nebraska, had a tradition of tossing oranges
onto the field. When they won the honor to go
to the orange ball. Tech had not been to a
bowl in a while, and Spike Diggs had us getting
close to a bowl bid which stirred talk of tech
(23:52):
making it to the Cotton Bowl, though I cannot verify
or remember the exact comment. My recollection is a sportswriter
or possibly sports talk radio personality from the Metroplex, notorious
for throwing shade at tech, said something to the effect
that the only bowl game tech could make was the
Tortilla Bowl. Following those comments, some students started tossing tortillas.
Some of us understood why and they flew great. The
(24:13):
closer we got to a winning record, the more tortillas
were tossed. Have you seen the toss up beginning of
the 95 Cotton Bowl? I was there great beginnings to
a really bad outing that even included the USC Trojan
Bands trombone section brawling with Radiohead. I digress. I wish
we could get rid of the couplet toss idea. I
can see that some folks remember tossing lid because it's
fun to toss things at games when you know you're
(24:34):
not going to hurt folks. The only connection would be
the fine, not the meaning of the tortilla. If I
have to accept a narrative that's published, I'll go with
a tortilla factory. But we'll always know. In my mind
it connects to oranges, a bowl bid and our tech
and West Texas mentality. It showed again this year with
the cactus. Go ahead and talk us down. We'll make
a tradition of it.
S3 (24:54):
I actually so I like.
S1 (24:57):
That he pointed out that it's fun to toss things
at games when you know you're not going to hurt
folks because I actually had someone say.
S3 (25:03):
That.
S1 (25:03):
They believed or a friend told them that they had
thrown out. Beer soaked tortillas, which was not pleasant. I
cannot vouch for that. I won't say that that's true
or untrue. I know in recent years that tech actually
did begin selling alcohol at games. So again, I can't
(25:26):
comment on that, but I don't think that's the majority.
But certainly not least, this is actually my favorite. Every
time I've shared it with someone, they've gotten a kick
out of it. So Gary says he thinks he knows
the real answer, but he doesn't think I'll be able
to print it because it reflects badly on UT or A&M.
I don't care if it reflects poorly on them, it's fine.
So he says, probably during a time Texas and A&M
(25:49):
had a hard time beating tech, they were pretty snake
bit against tech, he said. One of the typical double
jabs tech by the students made fun of a tech
degree versus an A&M degree. A&M told the joke that
Tech graduated more Taco Bell managers than any other college.
So the next tech home game, A&M and Texas player
were greeted with a flying taco barrage. It will probably
never end, he said.
S2 (26:11):
The arrogance is hard. It's hard to tolerate with that one,
but it is what it is.
S1 (26:15):
It is what it is. And to that I say,
let the tortillas fly. And that's the end of our
first ever weird West Texas. Do you have a different
tale to tell about any of our topics? Don't hesitate
to tell us. You can reach out to the Lubbock
Avalanche Journal or Amarillo Globe News on Facebook or Twitter.
You can also send an email to be Addison at
(26:36):
Lubbock Online with the subject line Weird West Texas or
shoot us a text at 806496 4073.
Howdy. My name is Brandi Addison. I'm the regional agriculture
and environmental reporter for the USA Today Network's West Texas region.
And this is weird. West Texas, the podcast. Each month
we'll explore some of the most odd, eccentric and sometimes
just plain weird things in our region. From the state's
northernmost town of Booker down into the big country westward
(00:27):
to the Permian Basin and all the way into the
rolling plains. We're so excited to take you on this
journey to discover our weird but wonderful West Texas. Now
let's get weird, y'all. Today I'm joined by my editor,
Adam Young, who oversees the Lubbock Avalanche Journal and Amarillo
Globe News. Adam, you ready to dive in?
S2 (00:47):
I am. Okay. So far this I think my main
takeaway from these is that all the comments that you're
having me have to vet now because of this this
darn series. So thank you.
S3 (01:01):
Yeah. So I've had a lot of people say that
they're excited to like keep reading though, right? Like and
we have a lot of new readers, new audience members.
So I love that we have, you know, a lot
of people really engaging here with this. So over the
last month, we've researched information about Will Rogers and soaps
head statue at Texas Tech, Cadillac Ranch, Texas Tech's tortilla
(01:24):
toss tradition and the ordered sheet. So I already know
that that was probably your favorite topic, just knowing who
you are. You were really excited to read it, so
let's just go ahead and talk about that. Um, yeah.
S2 (01:40):
I just wasn't familiar with that as a, as a concept.
Shame on me. But you know, I've been here in
Lubbock since 2005 when it came up to Tech, and
I was from Abilene originally, and that just wasn't something
I'd heard about. But so I appreciated learning a little
bit more about a topic that I wasn't somewhat familiar with.
(02:00):
Like I was with the Will Rogers statue or the
tortilla toss. Would you added some nice context to it,
made it a little bit more succinct, but this was
more of a learning experience for me. So, I mean,
how did you track all that information down?
S3 (02:15):
Yeah. So I actually got the idea because I'm in
this Facebook group called Postcards from the Panhandle, and this
woman posted a picture of a herd of sheep. I
linked it in the story through her backyard and Amarillo, like,
not the canyons, just like in town of Amarillo. And
so I decided from there that I was going to
look that up because I thought it was really interesting.
(02:35):
I found some stuff from The Atlantic, and there's also
a website I think called Texas Panhandle Bird Nerd. I
attempted to call a couple professors in the Natural Resources
department at Tech to No luck and also Texas Parks
and Wildlife. But they they didn't have much to say
about the sheep. So a lot of it was just
(02:56):
research their research regarding invasive species and all that stuff.
So going and just to expand on that, if y'all
didn't actually read the story, the ordered sheet basically replaced
the bighorn sheep, which are a native species in the Panhandle, right?
So QGIS in the late 1940s brought them over because
(03:17):
they thought they'd be a game species. Now more than
75,000 roam North America while they're actually a.
S1 (03:22):
Vulnerable species.
S3 (03:23):
In their native land of North Africa. So there's only
between 5000 and 10,000 individuals out there and they're actually
considered vulnerable. So that was interesting to me. And what
was really interesting to me was learning about the idea
of Texas, which Texas Parks and Wildlife wrote about in
a magazine, which is essentially the idea of non native
species that have come to Texas and totally thrived. While
(03:49):
they can't even struggle, you know, they're struggling to survive
in their own native lands abroad. That was really interesting.
And this whole thing has really kind of prompted an
exotic meat industry, which I thought was really interesting.
S2 (04:04):
Stood. I still was trying to get a good sense.
I think and your story mentioned population growth was perhaps
even going to, I guess, incursion of our neighborhoods and
cities into the right because rural areas and that's perhaps
why more people are seeing them.
S3 (04:23):
Yeah. Yeah. So I mean, if you think about it,
they only they released 31 in 1957. So think about
how many we have now. They have definitely expanded, but
so has our human population, right? So now our borders
between wildlife and humans are shrinking because of development, population growth, whatever.
(04:45):
And yeah, now they're making their way over to cities,
as with other wildlife animals, right? You know, now we're
seeing more coyotes, foxes, whatever. Just a common theme among Texas, right?
S2 (05:00):
You mentioned the exotic meat industries. That is that one
that people are utilizing. I've not seen rendered your dad
cheap meat. Yeah. So Market Street or H-E-B?
S3 (05:11):
Yeah. I mean, they have a ranch out in Terlingua
that host these hunts like four day hunts and they're
like 5 to $7000 for these people to do. And
they're already booked out through early 2024. And like dad,
because they're invasive, they actually don't have a set season.
You can go hunt them all year long. So the
fact that they're booked out that far in advance, like
(05:32):
really shows how essential this industry is to some people. Understood.
Definitely interesting. Okay. So I'm going to move on. I
actually did have one email on that and someone said
they found one out at sheep in central Texas. And
that's that's all the email was. So I did see, though,
that they did have one in Uvalde County a couple
(05:54):
of years ago that had disease and they were worried
about it spreading to other local animals.
S2 (06:00):
Yeah. I wonder if they're susceptible to the same diseases
that you see with some of the deer that we
get alerts from Texas Parks and Wildlife on. I didn't
see much of that. Or if they're immune to that
and they have their own unique issues.
S3 (06:14):
Yeah, I think it's like specific within sheep and goats.
You know how the avian flu is specific to birds? Okay.
So I'm going to move forward to Will Rogers and
Soap Suds. So we're both tech grads. Your wife works
at Tech, so we know a lot about Will Rogers
and soap sets. You know, the saddle tramps go and
(06:35):
wrap him every home football game and read. Um, and
so I actually read that. Let's go back with the
history of Will Rogers and Soap Suds. So this was
a gift by Armand Carter, who, if you did not know,
is like one of the Texas Tech's founders. That was
really interesting for me to learn because I'm a Fort
(06:55):
Worth native and you see his name all over Fort Worth,
all over TCU. And when someone told me that he
founded Texas Tech or was one of the founders, I
was I was shocked. I was like honestly shocked. Like
even to learn that the place that Will Rogers statue
sits on is called Americana Plaza. I did not know
that the entire front entrance of university, you know, the
university where the school is is called Carter Plaza.
S4 (07:19):
Which.
S3 (07:19):
I never knew. That was wild to me.
S2 (07:21):
So it's not commonly referred to that. I don't think
a lot of students say, hey, let's meet up at
the Carter Plaza before we walk over to Timmy's.
S3 (07:27):
Exactly. That's wild to me. Like, you know, we know
the name of Memorial Circle. We know the names of
all the little parks within the area, but we did
not know the name of that plaza. I wonder if
it's like our beef with TCU. I don't know. But
it was interesting to me. So actually then editor of
the AJ presented the casting of the statue to Lubbock,
(07:49):
which I did not know. That was really interesting to find. Um,
why was there a Will Rogers statue here? Okay, so
in what I in my research, I learned that, like
Bull Rogers has literally no associations with Texas whatsoever. And
Carter just believed that the statue would fit into the
traditions and scenery of West Texas memorializing Rogers lifetime as
(08:10):
a cowboy legend. And I couldn't think of a better
school in Texas to put a Will Rogers statue. If
we want to talk about cowboy legends, right?
S2 (08:18):
I mean, at the time, he was a cultural icon
across the country. Absolutely. Every community. Yeah, familiar with him,
just a national celebrity.
S3 (08:27):
But yeah, so our Mr. Cowboy culture, Alvin Davis, who
died not too long ago, he actually really got into
the cowboy way of life because he saw Will Rogers
just a couple months before he died. And that's when
he decided he wanted to be a cowboy. So he
has a lot of influence on West Texas, for sure.
So the thing about the sculpture, it was initially positioned
(08:49):
to face Northwest, so it appeared that Will Rogers and
Soap Suds were running into the sunset. Right. It was
even called Going into the Sunset or something like that.
That's the title of it. Um, but Lubbock decided that
the hind end facing east toward downtown Lubbock might insult
the local business economy. So they changed the degree by
(09:11):
23 angles. And now there's this theory that it faces
intentionally towards A&M. We have intentionally placed the hind end
towards A&M because we love to hate A&M. But yeah,
I've kind of.
S2 (09:24):
Heard mixed stories on whether it actually points in that
direction or not. I've not gone over there and like
check the trajectory myself, but it's certainly a nice story
that we embraced back when A&M was still in the
Big 12.
S3 (09:37):
Yeah, Yeah. And you know, so they actually did put
those rumors to rest a decade ago and interviewed Chris Sneed,
who was the vice president of the Alumni Association, and
he refuted that there was any truth behind the story.
He basically said, like, if we're going to be technical,
it's either Waco or Austin that it's facing, which either
way a big 12 school, you know, So that's interesting.
S2 (09:59):
Well, it's a fairly large behind. I mean, it kind
of depends on exactly what part of the behind part
of it. Surely it's got enough trajectory that some of
it's going to hit, uh, you know, College Station. Brian
But yeah, some of it.
S3 (10:14):
The whole yeah, that whole side of Texas. But, you know,
it's all West Texas, so it just hit more West Texas, right? Yeah.
You know, but the most interesting thing I learned about
the Will Rogers stuff was that The Saddle Tramp started
covering it during home football games to protect it because
(10:34):
it was actually painted in maroon after either I can't
remember if A&M one or a tech one. I think
tech one tech beat A&M and it was painted in maroon.
And so they decided at midnight before every home football game,
they would go wrap it in red crepe paper because
they wanted to protect the statue. So I thought that
was an interesting I never heard why that happened. So
(10:55):
I thought that was really interesting. Well, that.
S1 (10:57):
Was one theory.
S3 (10:58):
Another theory was that it just started when people wanted
to went to paint the campus red and they just
hung up red streamers and great paper all over campus.
S2 (11:07):
Yeah, even my whole time there is a student and,
you know, living here in the community, I haven't I
hadn't seen them wrap the statue until this last fall.
I guess it had a homecoming. So it's actually just
a really nice experience to go out there and watch
it and. Yeah, yeah, just some kind of a food
truck atmosphere out there now when they're doing that, so. Oh, okay.
S3 (11:29):
That's cool. I did not know that. Yeah, I went
once during my undergrad, but either way was really interesting
to kind of learn where that tradition came from. Okay,
So Cadillac Ranch, let's talk about Cadillac Ranch. So you
actually knew about the history of Cadillac Ranch, right? I
actually didn't really know about it.
S2 (11:48):
I mean, I knew it was kind of the Stanley
master and his connection to it. A little bit of
controversial thing.
S3 (11:55):
Yeah.
S2 (11:57):
I don't think that defines it, but I think that. No,
absolutely not. Painted a little bit. But I just know
it's been a long time. Kitschy attraction, interactive art for
folks in the Panhandle. I've never swung by it myself.
It's still on my to do list when I go
up there.
S3 (12:15):
Yeah. So it's actually, you know, the ant farm collective.
You saw that they brought that in. Was it the 70s?
It's going to hit its 50th anniversary within next year,
I believe so, yeah. I guess the 70s they decided
to do it. Stanley Marsh commissioned them, but it was
these artists who decided to put it together. Ten Cadillac model,
(12:36):
you know, vintage Cadillac models lined up with their nose
seemingly buried into the ground. Right. And they're at an
angle that's supposed to match the Pyramid of Giza and Egypt,
which I thought was really interesting, of course. I mean it.
The story behind it isn't super interesting, but it's really
(12:57):
interesting to see how much play this art just is
like random piece of art. This random exhibition has gotten
in popular culture. Like Bruce Springsteen had a song, James
Brown did a music video or had lyrics on it. Um.
S2 (13:13):
This sort of Texas travel guide, you're either going to
see that or you're going to see a scene of
Palo Duro Canyon to represent the Panhandle typically.
S3 (13:22):
Yeah, yeah. You know, like, like I had written that
cars had like a little fake car thing in it.
It was in the mountains, right? Because it's cars and
that's like the actual, like, big design that they have,
big installation that they have at the Cars exhibit in
Disney World. Right. So that's really interesting. Um, it's just
been in so many popular culture references, dozens, maybe hundreds,
(13:44):
I don't know, but I know for sure doesn't. So
it's just interesting to see how far that has grown.
It is really interesting to see how people, you know,
at the end of it I put that into this column.
I said something along the lines of this wasn't just
one person's art, like this is now a canvas for everybody, right?
This is an opportunity for everyone to showcase their creativity
(14:05):
or send a message, including the guy who decided to
set it ablaze one night. Right. It's become the face
of social justice activism in recent years, painted in pride,
colors painted in Black Lives Matter. So it's really interesting.
People from all over the world have come to this.
Small exhibit really is small in the grand scheme of
(14:25):
things and literally the middle of nowhere. It's fair to
say Amarillo, it's pretty much in the middle of nowhere
when you think of the entire like that. But yeah,
but if you're coming from another country or if you're
coming from New York or Florida or California, I think
it's safe to say that Amarillo like is not a
spot you would typically go see, you know, like on
(14:47):
its own. Like there are a lot of people who
go there. It gets yeah, it gets visitors.
S2 (14:52):
866 traffic.
S3 (14:54):
Yeah. So it's interesting. It's really weird just to see
how much it has grown like, and then it has
that like little Slug Bug ranch 35 miles west that
that inspired. So it's just, it's really cool to see
how it's just made its impact on the US right?
One of the most photographed roadside attractions in the nation.
S2 (15:17):
Yeah, it's up there with Wall Drug up in South Dakota,
which you perhaps have not seen, and just other kitschy
roadside attractions. The largest ball of yarn, you know, largest handbag. Well,
and then you've got the Cadillac Ranch, which is a
little bit more visual than I think than some of
the others.
S3 (15:35):
Yeah, a little bit more popular than the world's largest
jackrabbit here in Texas. Yeah. Okay. So Cadillac Ranch. Now
let's go into the tortilla toss. I have some emails
to read with this one, so. Oh, boy. So we
talked about this, the tortilla toss. You know, there's there's
(15:56):
two stories that surround this one. The first one is
that tech fans had originally tossed lids to their 44
ounce drinks. And next game, the lids were banned. Right.
So they decided to just grab tortillas because tortillas are
also a popular tailgating food and they're easy to throw. Right.
(16:19):
But there's another one that says that an ESPN announcer
before our Texas A&M game, of course, Texas A&M, we
got to Spike A&M whenever we can.
S2 (16:27):
Apparently they rile up the crowd.
S3 (16:30):
Yes. You know, so so the ESPN announcer said that
there's nothing in Lubbock but Texas Tech football and a
tortilla factory. So then they showed up to the game
and they threw tortillas at kickoff. Now, I don't know
which one is right. Both are amusing theories, but it's
wild because there was actually a tortilla penalty, right, where
(16:52):
Texas Tech would lose 15 yards if there were tortillas
thrown on the game, you know, on the field. But
it never stopped fans because tech fans are rowdy and
they really don't care. You know, how many times have
we got fined for storming the field or court this year? Right.
So it didn't stop anybody. But it was really interesting.
It's just a really interesting thing. Like people have even
(17:14):
learned that if you cut out the holes and, you
know holes in them, that they're going to go further
and they've come up with some really creative ways to
sneak them in, which I think is interesting. I remember
one football player had eaten one and did it on
video and like he went viral on Twitter and was like,
you don't want to want to know how that got here, right?
Like you wouldn't be doing that if you knew.
S2 (17:38):
Yeah, it's certainly a less destructive, I guess, fan habit
than what the student section would do and disassembling the
bleachers and passing those down.
S3 (17:47):
Yeah. Or the field post or whatever.
S2 (17:50):
You are throwing batteries. So yeah, I know the I
say it's seemingly harmless. I know there were quite a
few emails and comment posts that we got on that
story about the potentially racially insensitive origin of that tradition. Right.
(18:13):
And I know that former Avalanche Journal publisher Steve Beasley
had even shared that email with you. Is his theory
or his understanding of how it originated with a former
defensive player, Gabriel Rivera, and it kind of being somewhat
in honor of him. That's perhaps makes me a little
uncomfortable with it. It stems from that it was really
(18:35):
never a a tradition that I embraced when I was
a student there. But I was I was amused when
I saw it happen.
S3 (18:43):
Yeah. So I think that maybe some stories got crossed
because a similar I'm not going to argue whether again,
whether it was racist or not, but I think some
stories got crossed because a similar incident happened in California
a couple years ago and it was at a high
school basketball game. And the entirety of the other team
that they threw tortillas up was Latino. So this high
(19:06):
school basketball team got banned for the remainder of the season.
They lost the game. That coach got fired and they're
still not playing basketball. That's happened in 2021. They cannot
return to games until 2024. So I think that's might
be where some stories got crossed there. And I know
that I think another university in California does it during
(19:27):
track meets. I think that might be where stories got crossed,
but I'm not the one to dictate, you know, what's
racist and what's not. So we'll stem away from that.
But I do want to read some emails, so I've
shared a couple with you. Um, this chief financial officer
at a local diocese actually reached out to me via
Twitter and said that he believes that there might be
(19:49):
a connection between the Romans, which threw flatbread at gladiator games.
So I think that was a really interesting theory. I'd
never heard anyone like go that far back in association.
Do I think that tech fans are well aware of
that history? Probably not. I think tech fans are just
rowdy and probably like to throw things.
S2 (20:09):
Yeah, perhaps some students majoring in the classics would would
be familiar with that story, but I don't know if
that's what inspired them to go ahead and do that.
That one seems like a stretch.
S1 (20:19):
Jim B said.
S5 (20:20):
Tortillas, float beans.
S3 (20:21):
Don't. End of story.
S1 (21:10):
Um, this one was interesting. An archivist at Texas Tech
did confirm that it was probably started from the tortillas
factory comment, but.
S3 (21:20):
She continued.
S1 (21:20):
To say that Bob Barker, who was actually the athletic
director at the time, was the one who pushed for
the ban because apparently he thought it was unseemly for
the tech students to be throwing food. That's her words,
not mine. I thought that was interesting. David said, I
graduated from Tech in May 1989, and my memory was
the previous fallout. One of the home games. The local
(21:41):
grocery store United handed out sampler packs of 2 or
3 of their fresh meat tortillas as a promotion upon
entry to the game. Previous to this game, there had
been several students who began throwing yellow flags in the
air when a penalty was called on the fill. Now,
armed with tortillas, they began throwing them out and it
just continued game after game after that. Now let's head
into some of the more interesting ones. JJ said he
(22:03):
grew up in Lubbock and lived there from 90 or no, sorry,
76 to 93. His father was actually the dean of
Mass Comm and he was a ballboy for the Red
Raiders for multiple sports, but mainly basketball in the early
80 seconds. He said he remembers the day because it
was his mom's birthday. November 9th. No, no, November 19th, 1988.
It was Thanksgiving time and it snowed that week. Tech
(22:24):
was mediocre, his words, not mine. But Houston was stacked
and the quarterback was Andre Ware, a Heisman candidate. The
attendance was low, but there was a lot of snow
in the stadium. On the way into the game, there
was a vendor handing out free batteries, of all things.
During the first half, people put batteries in the snowballs
and started throwing them onto the field. The game was
stopped more than once and the second time Coach Dykes
(22:45):
Spike actually spoke over the PA system to stop throwing
things onto the field. It helped a little, but Houston
completed a comeback and beat tech by one point in
the fourth quarter, which prompted another slew of battery filled snowballs.
After the game. After the game, Coach Dyke said, People
throw stuff all the time, but batteries and snowballs, they
ought to throw something soft like a tortilla. I'm not
(23:07):
sure if it was in the newspaper or anywhere in print,
he said. But the year ended and in the fall
of 1989, his freshman year at Tech, there were a
few tortillas thrown at each game until it became It
is what it is today. I can tell you I've
heard many stories about the tortillas, he said. But this
is definitely the way it happened. That was interesting, and
this one's also really interesting, Carlos says. I'm still amazed
(23:30):
the conversation does not connect to what I remember. As
a long time tech fan. In the early 90s, there
was not as many bowl games and few corporate sponsors.
The games were also aligned with conferences. The Big eight champ,
typically Oklahoma or Nebraska, had a tradition of tossing oranges
onto the field. When they won the honor to go
to the orange ball. Tech had not been to a
bowl in a while, and Spike Diggs had us getting
close to a bowl bid which stirred talk of tech
(23:52):
making it to the Cotton Bowl, though I cannot verify
or remember the exact comment. My recollection is a sportswriter
or possibly sports talk radio personality from the Metroplex, notorious
for throwing shade at tech, said something to the effect
that the only bowl game tech could make was the
Tortilla Bowl. Following those comments, some students started tossing tortillas.
Some of us understood why and they flew great. The
(24:13):
closer we got to a winning record, the more tortillas
were tossed. Have you seen the toss up beginning of
the 95 Cotton Bowl? I was there great beginnings to
a really bad outing that even included the USC Trojan
Bands trombone section brawling with Radiohead. I digress. I wish
we could get rid of the couplet toss idea. I
can see that some folks remember tossing lid because it's
fun to toss things at games when you know you're
(24:34):
not going to hurt folks. The only connection would be
the fine, not the meaning of the tortilla. If I
have to accept a narrative that's published, I'll go with
a tortilla factory. But we'll always know. In my mind
it connects to oranges, a bowl bid and our tech
and West Texas mentality. It showed again this year with
the cactus. Go ahead and talk us down. We'll make
a tradition of it.
S3 (24:54):
I actually so I like.
S1 (24:57):
That he pointed out that it's fun to toss things
at games when you know you're not going to hurt
folks because I actually had someone say.
S3 (25:03):
That.
S1 (25:03):
They believed or a friend told them that they had
thrown out. Beer soaked tortillas, which was not pleasant. I
cannot vouch for that. I won't say that that's true
or untrue. I know in recent years that tech actually
did begin selling alcohol at games. So again, I can't
(25:26):
comment on that, but I don't think that's the majority.
But certainly not least, this is actually my favorite. Every
time I've shared it with someone, they've gotten a kick
out of it. So Gary says he thinks he knows
the real answer, but he doesn't think I'll be able
to print it because it reflects badly on UT or A&M.
I don't care if it reflects poorly on them, it's fine.
So he says, probably during a time Texas and A&M
(25:49):
had a hard time beating tech, they were pretty snake
bit against tech, he said. One of the typical double
jabs tech by the students made fun of a tech
degree versus an A&M degree. A&M told the joke that
Tech graduated more Taco Bell managers than any other college.
So the next tech home game, A&M and Texas player
were greeted with a flying taco barrage. It will probably
never end, he said.
S2 (26:11):
The arrogance is hard. It's hard to tolerate with that one,
but it is what it is.
S1 (26:15):
It is what it is. And to that I say,
let the tortillas fly. And that's the end of our
first ever weird West Texas. Do you have a different
tale to tell about any of our topics? Don't hesitate
to tell us. You can reach out to the Lubbock
Avalanche Journal or Amarillo Globe News on Facebook or Twitter.
You can also send an email to be Addison at
(26:36):
Lubbock Online with the subject line Weird West Texas or
shoot us a text at 806496 4073.
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