Not So Deep in the Heart of Dixie: Texas
Texas cities moseyed down a different trail than the post-Civil War Deep South. This was because Texas (1) attracted an in-migration pattern all its own. The political culture that developed, especially in its interior, was NOT that of the Old South; (2) larger than France, Texas supported several sub-regional metro-sized urban/economic clusters; (3) experienced periods as a colony and independent nation, forming its own distinctive identity/culture previous to its joining the Union in 1845; (4) remarkably isolated and “wild westie”, it was off the radar screens of Wall Street and Big City corporate behemoths, allowing local banking and finance systems to operate with some autonomy, and (5) while on the edges of the Old South Planter economy and politics, a distinctly different cattle/meat-packing agglomeration naturally developed in its interior. Early twentieth century discovery of rich oil/gas resources, producing a powerful “platform” agglomeration as the auto industry in Michigan, yanked much of the Old South territories into developing brand new economic bases. And like it or not, there was something in Texan water that nourished the most unbridled competitive entrepreneurism yet seen on the continent. Texans seemingly evolved a Darwinian gene for the competitive urban hierarchy.
And Texas being Texas its distinctive ED, thoroughly Privatist, displayed one characteristic above all—hyperbolic exuberance. Providing muscle for that exuberance was a political process/policy system dominated by its largely self-made business elite and a political culture which seemed “Tidewaterish” given its citizenry’s willingness to follow that elite. Pre-1920 Texas-style ED is as pure a business elite-driven economic development as has ever existed in America. Competing with other cities was evident from Day One. Most Texan cities, were growth machines from birth—and remain so to the present day. Despite such intense competition, it’s amazing the present-day urban hierarchy (Houston (1st), San Antonio (2nd) and Dallas (3rd)) has characterized Texas since 1930.
Early Rise of Texan Cities
Eastern coastal/border Texas were part of Deep South cotton-rice/slave-based export economy–that caused its reluctant joining with the Confederacy. Coastal regions (with only one natural harbor, Galveston) required infrastructure, sustained population growth, and new markets to develop further, but Union victory and the geography/climate of inland Texas halted cotton expansion. Other sectors developed in the inland plains areas. In the early 1870’s a network of inland Texas cities formed around cattle-raising and a “get those doggies to market” economy. Thanks to cattle-raising, Railroads followed (Houston-1856/1861, Dallas-1871, Fort Worth-1876, San Antonio-1877, El Paso-1881). Serious Texan city-building followed the railroads (Wheeler, 1968, pp. 47-8).
Galveston was Texas’s most populous city in 1870 (almost 14,000), followed by San Antonio (12,000) and Houston (9,000). Municipal business elites were already active in city-building and economic development in most Texan cities—San Antonio an exception. “The business communities of Dallas [Fort Worth] and Houston historically have had more aggressive attitude toward growth than has San Antonio. Part of the explanation for this lies in the social origins of each nineteenth century merchant groups” (Miller & Johnson, 1968, p. 10). Galveston, Houston and San Antonio ethnic immigration flows differed. Aggressive competition among cities typically motivated Texan business elites, but less so San Antonio elites who mostly competed among themselves to tap the federal military post located there.
Texan Business Cultures
Houston’s business class originated from the Mid-Atlantic and New England. The Allen brothers (from New York) incorporated the city in 1837; they were responsible for Houston’s first (1856) railroad linkage with neighboring Galveston and Beaumont. By 1861, of the 450 miles of Texas railroad then-existing, 80% went to Houston. “This aggressive rail-building program thus laid the foundations for individual fortunes and significant local capital accumulation for further urban investments” Houston business elites continued their aggressiveness after the Civil War, evidenced by a 1866 business-led public meeting at which, “Houstonians approved a coherent blueprint for the city’s future development” (Miller & Johnson, 1968, p. 11). Cotton was the export crop at that time.
Prominent leaders of Dallas business came from the Upper South and Middle West (John S. Armstrong, John C. McCoy and John Nealy Bryan (the town’s first settler)). Incorporated in 1856, Bryan (1866) also “presided over a public meeting in which the fledgling business community laid out its goals for future development, especially railroad connections to Eastern markets”. The goal was quickly achieved in 1871 by businessman William Galson. He raised funds and donated land to steal away the Houston and Texas Central Railroad from another location. These actions were repeated to acquire the Texas and Pacific Railroad connection (that one cost $200,000 bond and $5,000 cash) (Miller & Johnson, 1968, p. 11). Dallas, too, brought in the railroad as its first step in economic development.
San Antonio, a town built around the state’s largest military base, was originally settled by Irish and German immigrants direct from Europe (German, Irish)–and by Deep South businessmen. The electorate and business community were soon dominated by German and cotton-state southerner coalition. The extremely individualistic policy system that followed distributed benefits to individual businesses, neighborhoods, and ethnic groups rather than foster overall community growth. For many decades San Antonio consistently was unable to reach consensus on a future oriented-community-wide development plan—in contrast to Dallas and Houston. The one major exception was an 1880’s project that developed a site for a new Fort (Fort Sam Houston) in response to the military’s threat to move its existing base unless the city made a suitable site available (Johnson, 1968, pp. 33-57).
San Antonio’s business community lived off the military base, and that military installation defined their economic development perspective. “San Antonio has no parallel to Dallas and Houston community commitment to local development; there was no public meeting immediately following the Civil War [and] San Antonio’s major merchants exhibited a striking indifference to … the railroad … San Antonio was the last {1877] of the three major metropolitan areas to be hooked into the national railroad and commercial network during the nineteenth century” (Miller & Johnson, 1968, p. 12). Moreover, San Antonio failed in its early attempt to establish a Board of Trade (1872), and did not found a Chamber of Commerce until 1910—decades after other Texan communities (Miller & Johnson, 1968, p. 15).
Conclusion and Segue Way
That the post-Civil War South was not a warmed-over irrelevant version of the economic development goings on in New York City, Philadelphia, Chicago, Boston, Detroit or Cleveland is obvious. That the economic development decisions made by southern elites in these years set the stage for a great deal of what was to follow in our state and local ED history is also equally obvious. That there was overlap in some key tunes, like industrialization, chambers as top EDOs, and the common use of growth strategies like tax abatement and railroad infrastructure is certainly correct–but the lyrics were entirely different–and led down a totally different path and future.
Economic development in the South was “fried” by conditions and realities the South alone confronted, resources the South alone possessed, and the “experience” of losing the Civil War and living thereafter to do something about it. Southern-fried ED has not been to everyone’s liking–especially since nowadays the “New South” is home to many a northerner–but it is the consequence of a flow of events and dynamics, and choices made nearly a century and half ago by dimly remembered and stereotyped state and local policy systems.
So now it’s time to “go West young man”.
Ron W. Coan 