Texas State Historical Association - My Texas

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The Battleship Texas

One sunny, humid day in 1948 my parents and other members of our family packed a picnic lunch, loaded long-poled dip nets, shorter poles with strings on them, and bacon scraps, and left Pasadena for a trip to the Buffalo Bayou ship channel to witness a historic event: the battleship Texas was being towed into dock. While waiting for the big event we caught crabs. I liked tying the bacon on the string and then pulling it up to check for crabs, being very careful to not get pinched. The ones with only one claw always drew my admiration because they must have been in a terrible fight with another crab.

There were boats of all sizes waiting for the event and finally the tug boats came pushing, pulling, and bumping this faraway gray ship. I was not as impressed with the battleship as I was with the tub full of crabs with their eyes protruding and their whiskers waving at me. When we got back home and my mom put a large pot of water on to boil, I ran from the house to keep from seeing the awful deed she was about to perform.

A short time later we went back to where the battleship was docked and got to “board her.” The ship was totally gray. My dad, a veteran, said the navy's slogan was "If it doesn’t move, paint it." What stands out in memory the most about this metal monster was the tall lookout tower, the huge guns, and the fact that there was a gray-striped cat who lived on the ship and was said to be the ship's mascot. I wondered if he also had stood still and had been painted gray.

Sandra Gilstrap
Round Rock, Texas
Published: July 12, 2006