Thursday, June 14, 2012

Today I Learned About The Murder Of Fort Worth's Burwell Christmas Evans

I know I've mentioned what I think is Fort Worth's best blog previously, a time or two, that blog being Hometown by Handlebar.

Almost daily I'm impressed and amazed at the stories this Bloggerman, Mike Nichols, tells.

Mike Nichols is making Fort Worth, past and present, seem so interesting methinks the City of Fort Worth and the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce should be paying this guy.

Today's Hometown by Handlebar is yet one more instance of yet one more piece of Fort Worth history, unknown to me, til today. A sad tale of a bad crime of the sort that could be in our headlines today, but this happened way back in the same century the Civil War took place in.

Have I mentioned before that one of my majors, in college, was history? History has always been my favorite subject.

The title of today's Hometown by Handlebar blogging is Once Upon a Crime: “Woe, Woe, Woe”

Below is the first paragraph...

Burwell Christmas Evans was born on December 25, 1844, in South Carolina. When the Civil War began he was a student at the Citadel military college. Just sixteen years old, he enlisted. After the war in 1872 he headed west. He settled in Fort Worth and opened a dry goods store downtown. In 1876 he offered customers something new: On the second floor of his store he opened Fort Worth’s first respectable theater. Illuminated by kerosene lamps, such noted entertainers as humorist Josh Billings performed in the theater upstairs. And on its stage Madame Rentz’s Female Minstrels brought the cancan to Cowtown. Ew la la, y’all.

Click here to continued reading to find out all about the woeful crime...

2 comments:

Steve A said...

Excellent blog reference. Another, that also covers Dallas, is at http://metroplexing.blogspot.com/

That one has stories from both ends of the Metroplex and places like Arlington as well. If I could only read one, I might pick yours, but fortunately, we aren't so limited.

Anne said...

BC Evans was my GG grandfather. His murder is such a tragic story, and I have often wondered if there is more to the story. (As crazy as that may sound)