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On this day in 1891, Sid Richardson was born. During his lifetime, Sid demonstrated two defining characteristics: an ability to make lasting friendships and the ability to make money. John Connally, Sid Richardson, Lyndon Johnson, Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce Dinner, 1957. Courtesy, Fort Worth Star-Telegram Collection, Special Collections, The University of Texas at Arlington Library, Arlington, Texas. Though he was friends with many famous people throughout his career, including at the time, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, Secretary of the Treasury George Humphrey, and Texas Congressman Sam Rayburn and Senator Lyndon Johnson, Sid shied away from the public [...]

Last week we temporarily installed a display in the galleries of a book from the museum’s library by folklorist and author J. Frank Dobie, The Longhorns -- originally from the library of Sid Richardson. Sid Richardson enjoyed a warm friendship with Dobie who, at Sid’s invitation, used Richardson’s San Jose Island ranch as a writer’s haven in 1939 when he wrote The Longhorns. Each print edition of The Longhorns opens with a dedication to Sid, and each of the twenty chapters, illustrated by Tom Lea, is dedicated to a significant individual in Dobie’s life: TO SID W. RICHARDSON who is attempting [...]

Sunday marked SRM artist Peter Hurd’s birthday. During the Great Depression era, like many of his peers, Hurd joined the New Deal art projects to execute several post office murals in locations such as Dallas and Big Spring, Texas and Alamogordo, New Mexico, his native state. In Texas alone, the federal government commissioned 106 artworks for 69 post offices and federal buildings. Several of these pieces are now lost. As a scholar and admirer of American and Texas art of the 1930s, I have made it my personal mission to visit and document the remaining. Peter Hurd, O Pioneers, 1938, [...]

“In the city men shake hands and call each other friends but it’s the lonesome places that ties their harts together and harts do not forget.” - Charles M. Russell to Santa Fe [Tom Conway], March 24, 1917 Last week we welcomed back home one of our own – Charles Russell’s Man’s Weapons Are Useless When Nature Goes Armed. Originally hung in Sid Richardson's dining room at his San Jose Island home, this painting is a favorite among our visitors and had been out on loan with the traveling exhibition, Harmless Hunter: The Wildlife Work of Charles M. Russell, which [...]