Beaumont, TX 10/24/2013

On the road again Thursday Oct. 24.  Remembering my parents today.  They were married on this day in 1940.  It is also my Dad's birthday.  In our travels I think of so many things I wish I could ask you.  Love you both and miss you.

Historic house in Beaumont, TX

 Thomas Edison Museum 

 1929 Christmas tree lights

 Interesting that they insulated the lines with paraffin and beeswax.

Texas Energy Museum:  photos were not allowed.  I got these off their website.

 What incredible Museum explaining the ENERGY from OIL & how it is processed.

Crude oil is processed into more things than I realized.  Just a few of the over 6,00 products:

Fuel, lubricants, plastic, rubber, clothing, ink, cortisone, aspirin, camera, ammonia, anesthetic, soap.

 Videos on drilling and transporting oil by barges.

 Spindletop dubbed "The Lucas Gusher," the oil discovery.  Spindletop Hill changed the 

economy of Texas and helped to usher in the petroleum age. 

 A talking "dummy" telling about Spindletop's discovery.

 Super abundance of rigs during the peak.

 St. Anthony Cathedral Basilica

Its roots reach back into the nineteenth century. Early history notes that priests riding on horseback or traveling by buggy braved the inclement weather, mud and mosquitoes to minister to the Catholics living in the small community that had grown up around the sawmill and port of Beaumont, Texas.

 

 Papal Ombrellino (Basilica Umbrella)

Umbrellas (fully opened) were once used during Papal Processions through the streets of Rome to protect the Pope from the weather. Today the Ombrellino is used as a symbol of a basilica’s bond to the Papacy. The Ombrellino stand half-opened in basilicas throughout the world as a way of symbolically anticipating the arrival of the Pope at a basilica, his "home away from home." 

 Papal Tintinnabulum (Basilica Bell)

Bishop's chair

 What an impressive Cathedral.

We stayed at Walmart in Liberty, TX.  Another busy day of learning more about Texas.