REMEMBERING THE ALAMO
TEXAS-TRAVEL-ART-1,382&ADD-TAS
SAN ANTONIO, Texas
-- Most days, a vendor sells sno-cones from a cart outside the Alamo. It can get oven-hot in San Antonio, especially in the landmarkís large, open, tree-framed plaza. But the sno-cones underscore what conditions were like for the men and women who defended the mission in late February and early March, 1836. They faced unrelenting thirst, extreme heat and blustery cold, non-existent sanitation and scant medical supplies, and those were just some of the physical privations. There were also psychological hardships: watching as Mexican President Antonio LÛpez de Santa Anna massed nearly 2,600 well-armed soldiers to face fewer than 250 poorly-equipped defenders who sent out desperate pleas for reinforcements. Except for 32 men from the town of Gonzalez, none ever came. Texas is proud of this small complex of buildings and mindful of its history. The facade is one of a handful of bonafide American icons, an image so powerful that it seems to grow larger as you look at it. After you have done that you will be ready to go inside, to relive a legend, unique among fables in that it really happened. By JEFF ROVIN. With 13 photos.
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| The Alamo (Photo credit: Terese Loeb Kreuzer) |
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