A second siege of the Alamo

Even though the words “Remember the Alamo” are available on t-shirts, bumper-stickers, and kitchen kitsch, the Alamo wasn’t always remembered with the reverence it is today. For a long time, the Alamo was used mostly as a warehouse. Even the church, which people rather universally think of as the Alamo, was used as an army […]

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
The New York Times ran an
interesting article on Valentine's
Day, 1908 under
this headline Siege
of Alamo Ended.
A short Hispanic fireball of a
woman. Edina Desarrollo
had single handedly taken over
the long barracks of the Alamo
complex three days before.
She had padlocked herself, in fact,

(00:22):
and refused the sheriff's
department's demands that she vacate
the building.
They cut off electricity, water and
food.
She had to live alone in the cold,
rat infested old warehouse
for three days and nights, speaking
to reporters through cracks
in the walls.
Through this act of civil
disobedience, Adina Desarrollo

(00:44):
earned national attention
and sympathy in the press.
In modern terms, she went
viral.
Many newspapers covered her struggle
to keep the long barracks from being
torn down and replaced by
a luxury hotel or a park.
The Saint Louis Dispatch compared
her siege to that of

(01:05):
William B Travis, who asked the
world to help him defend the Alamo
from tyranny.
This may seem hyperbolic, but it
appears more in order when
we consider that Adina DeSalvo, his
father, was the first vice
president of the Republic of Texas
in 1836.
Clara Driscoll, another woman with

(01:25):
ties to the revolution, bankrolled
earlier efforts to keep the Alamo
from developers.
Clara's grandfather fought its own
to send them, but Driscoll didn't
see the use in.
Edina dissolved his fight for the
long barracks.
DeSalvo had a hard time
convincing her and others
that the barracks still had the
original walls intact,

(01:45):
and that that is where most of the
Alamo heroes died.
She argued that it was the most
sacred place in
the Alamo complex.
After three days and sympathetic
press coverage far near
then Texas Governor Thomas Campbell
sent a representative to San Antonio
and promised Mr. Isabela
that the long barracks portion of

(02:06):
the Alamo would remain in state
hands until the litigation
over its future was fairly settled.
She relented and came out of the
building, weak from little food
and water.
Dina DeSalvo is brave.
Stand preserved The Alamo
grounds as we know them today.
Sometime later, historians confirmed
DeSalvo was right.
The original walls of the long

(02:28):
barracks were indeed still there
behind the warehouses, crude wooden
infrastructure.
So both Adina DeSalvo and Clara
Driscoll, despite their clashing
visions, are saviors
of the Alamo as we
know it today.
Thank you, Adena.
Thank you, Clara.
For pointing the way.

(02:50):
I'm W.F. Strong.
These are Stories from Texas.
Some of them are true.