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The Island Moon Published by Island Moon Publishing, LLC 15201 S. Padre Island Drive Ste. 250 Corpus Christi, TX. 78418 editor@islandmoon.com (361) 949-7700
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The
Island Moon The Island Newspaper since 1996
Island Area News ● Events ● Entertainment
September 27, 2012
Photo by Rick Reichenbach
The Island where we like low humidity and high humility.
Around The Island
By Dale Rankin editor@islandmoon.com
We’ve hit that patch of the season when we have Chamber of Commerce Weather and the fishing is starting to kick in. We’ve been hearing reports of large schools of baitfish in the channel in Port A and the Big Reds are running as they make their way to open water and the fisherpersons are shoulder to shoulder along the beach and Packery Channel. A little more north wind and things will get busy.
Effort to Build Artificial Offshore Reef Takes a Giant Step Forward Destination for anglers and divers 10 miles from Packery Channel The move to create an artificial reef offshore from Packery Channel took a giant leap forward on Tuesday as the Corpus Christi City Council approved on first reading, a contract to allow material to build the reef to be stored at the Port of Corpus Christi.
Speaking of Packery, the water has been moving through the channel of late with a seldom seen ferocity. Last weekend the current with the outgoing tide was moving so fast it left a sandy trail over a hundred yards seaward as it hauled sand from the channel out to open water. The swells coming in made it tricky for boaters entering and leaving the channel but the calm water along the North Jetty made for rather easy passage.
Sign Police The Sign Police are still out in force writing tickets and The Island has been fertile hunting for them. In one day last week a total of 45 illegal signs were removed from around the city and 20 of them were political signs on The Island. Islanders vote and the politicians know it. Last week alone the Sign Police handed out 70 citations citywide, gave 29 warnings, and removed 137 illegal signs. A good many of those were also on The Island which were found to be violation of the sign rules in the Island Overlay Zone which pretty much prevents businesses from putting up any freestanding signs.
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Permitting for the reef has already been obtained by Texas Parks and Wildlife Division (TPWD) from the U.S. Corp of Engineers for a 160-acre reef site located approximately 10.4 miles east/northeast of the Packery Channel jetties, between North Padre Island and Port Aransas. Concrete material is now readily available and more will soon be available from the future demolition of the Copano Bay Bridge. A site to gather the material for the reef was needed before the collection process could begin.
Island PAC Backs Scott, Loeb, Riojas for At-Large Council Seats By Dale Rankin
Services, Loeb is running for his A crowd of about 150 second term on registered Island voters the council and turned out Wednesday is a commercial night at the Comfort Suites property and meeting room to endorse management three candidates in the Atcompany, and both Large races for the Corpus were endorsed by Christi City Council in the the PAC in the David Loeb November balloting. Lillian Riojas last city elections. Members of the Island Riojas is the United Political Action Committee voted to Senior Manager of Public Affairs for Valero back current At-Large members Mark Scott, Refinery. David Loeb, and newcomer Lillian Riojas for The three join current District 4 Council the posts. The three Member Chris Adler as the PAC nominee in the top vote getters in the Mayor’s race, and Islander Colleen McIntyre as November vote will the nominee for District 4 to replace Adler. become members of the new council. The PAC was organized just over five years Scott is a former ago to unite the 6200 registered voters in the District 4 Council two Island precincts who vote in the highest Member which numbers of any two precincts in Nueces represents The Island County. In the previous two city election cycles and is President of nine of ten candidates backed by the PAC have Mark Scott San Jacinto Title won their races.
Date Set for La Posada Lighted Boat Parade
The approval of the lease enables TPWD to begin stockpiling the material on three acres of land owned by the Texas General Land Office at the north end of Rincon Road on the Rincon Channel near the port.
Reefs Continued on A4
Recipes wanted
It’s Tunas Time in Texas!
Naked Kleberg We are unhappy to report that the Naked Men of Kleberg Beach have returned. There were several sightings last week as these guys run around with their reverse lobster tans and squishy parts a floppin’ on the eight miles of beach in Kleberg County where the Kleberg lawdogs deign to trod. The problem is that the beach is a sixty mile drive from the Kleberg County seat in Kingsville and the Naked Men of Kleberg know this. So if you go down there keep your Buck Knife handy in case you need to poke out your one good eye.
Boat salvage We were on the Kleberg Beach watching the salvage operation of the Stock Picker which had a bad week no matter how you slice it. First, she sank by the bow in her slip in the canals, then after a tow out through the Packery ended up floundering on the beach in Kleberg. It took a large crane to get her out of the surf. Where she is now only the Boat Fairy knows.
Oh man! Well Green Bay Packer fans what can we say? The ball comes down, the players go up, Packer fans hearts drop. We have a fair number of Packer fans here on our Island and there was no joy in Packerville after Monday night’s Replacement Ref Smorgasbord. But the Bear fans and the Cowboy fans will head up to Dallas this weekend happy, but only half of them will be happy on the return trip. Packer fans we feel your pain.
Manatee sighting We had our first manatee sighting of the season last week when one of the big fellows was seen checking out the T-Heads. He hasn’t been seen on The Island yet but it’s just a matter of time. All of the visitors to the Coastal Bend sooner of later get burned out on downtown and find their way to The Island. Keep looking for him and in the meantime say hello if you see us Around The Island.
We see them everywhere and so often that we don’t really even notice they are there. They begin showing up cactus green on Prickly Pear cactus in mid-summer and by the beginning of September they are beginning to turn red. They ride on the Island wind like so many rojo parasites but 500 years ago this fruit was the main reason the Karankawa Indians were able to make The Island their home.
The Padre Island Yacht Club has announced the date for this year’s La Posada Lighted Boat Parade. The two-night event will kick off on the north side canals on Friday, December 7. The parade through the south canals will be the next night, Saturday, December 8. The Friday event will start at 7 p.m. while the Saturday event will kick off at 6 p.m. The U.S. Marines will collect for Toys for Tots on both nights. The loading of the toys will begin at 9 a.m., December 9 at the Yacht Club with brunch
They go by various names, cactus apple, Indian fig, or Barbary, and they grow on the nopales of the ubiquitous Prickly Pear cactus found pretty much everywhere in South Texas.
A little Island History
The Karankawas called them tunas and since they got here before anyone else we’ll go with that. Each September the various bands of the Karankawas gathered in the area south of the Nueces River for their annual gorging on the tunas and it was said to be the only time of year when they had enough to eat. The rest of the year they hung around the backdoor at Snoopy’s and asked for leftovers.
By Dale Rankin In the late summer of 1840 a band of 1000 Comanche Indians had raided and plundered the South Texas town of Victoria and the port town of Linnville which at the time was the second largest port in Texas. The Indians were now headed back up the Guadalupe Valley with about 3000 head of horses and mules plundered from the settlements, along with about a dozen white captives, and $300,000 worth of goods that included top hats and umbrellas that had been bound for the stores of San Antonio but now decorated and shaded the heads of Comanche warriors.
It was at this festival in 1534 that Cabeza de Vaca and his fellow Spanish wanders were Cactus Continued on A4
Port Aransas Considers War on Coyotes
“I shouldn’t have to pull my gun to walk my Chihuahua” By Sara Hendricks When Marcy Matthews Ward Thomas was a little girl in Port Aransas in the 1930s, the coyotes would stay on their side of the pond and the town dogs on theirs. There’s little doubt which ones crossed the pond first considering the extensive development in Port Aransas, particularly during the last decade. Coyotes Continued on A4
to follow. There will also be a kickoff party at Scuttlebutt’s Restaurant, no date has yet been set for that event. Jim Witherill who has been the Parade Marshal for the past ten years is hanging up his radio after this year and is looking for someone who is interested in taking over that role. If you are interested contact the Yacht Club or call us here at the Moon and we will pass it along.
The Battle of Plum Creek
They were led by Chief Buffalo Hump War Chief of the Penateka band of the Comanche Indians. His Tekwapu (Comanche) name, properly transliterated was Po-cha-naquar-hip which meant “erection that won’t go down.” He was in his mid-40s and his appearance was described as, “The pure unadulterated picture of a North American Indian, who, unlike the rest of his tribe, scorned every form of European dress. His body naked, a buffalo robe around his loins, brass rings on his arms, a string of beads around his neck, and with his long, coarse black hair hanging down…with the serious facial expression of the North American
Indian which seems to be apathetic to the European.”
We want to fight them before they get to the mountains Even before the Comanches had raided the towns signs of their presence had been detected by a the Rev. Z.N. Morrel, a Baptist Minister traveling by ox cart just outside Bastrop. While passing between the Guadalupe and Lavaca rivers he crossed the trail made by the Indians on their way south toward Victoria and managed to push his oxen thirty miles in twelve hours to deliver the news to Colonel Ed Burleson in LaGrange. As he delivered the news a rider came in waving a piece of paper. It read: “General: The Indians have sacked and burned the town of Linnville; carried off several prisoners. We made draw fight with them at Casa Blanca. Could not stop them. We want to fight them before they get to the mountains. We have sent expressman up the Guadalupe. Ben McCulloch.” By the time the message reached LaGrange McCulloch had already joined Captain Mathew (Old Paint) Caldwell and the two men were riding north with eighty men headed for the Guadalupe crossing at Plum Creek, just outside the town of Lockhart History Continued on A6