RUNNIN’ WITH THE BIG DOGS The Long, Twisted History of the Texas-OU Rivalry docx

[...]... invaders of October, came to Dallas boiling with the intent to show up and be somebody The beginning chapters and verses from the Book of Texodus tell us that at first things were good, 17 RUNNIN’ WITH THE BIG DOGS and then the spirit of the people of the land took over Before long, and for decades then to come, anybody staying downtown the night before the Texas-OU game would drift off to sleep to the. .. the lullaby of sirens and shattering glass “In the early 1950s, they had a Texas-OU dance at the convention center, and there was a big pep rally The Texas cheerleaders would climb up on the overhang in front of the Adolphus Then the parties that involved the students in town for the game, those moved out of downtown, and that was when the idiots began to take over the streets By 1952, the Dallas police... match it This had become a 15 RUNNIN’ WITH THE BIG DOGS petroleum-based rivalry, born of the spirit and reckless élan that characterized the lords of the oil patch, who were imbued with a brashness of stride that one might see in a man leaving the dice table with his pockets full the natural cool that comes from cash flow The pathway to prosperity and happiness in the world was chained to three... little bit more than half of the playing field in the Cotton Bowl, from the tip of the goalpost in the south end zone out just past the fifty My scheme had been to bribe the Ferris wheel operator with a couple of cartons of Camels and have him stop the thing with my little cage on top and tell everybody that the ride broke down Meanwhile, I’d be up there swaying in this on-topof -the- world cage and watching... cone They’d been talking about fitting out the UT football team in sandals with cleats Now, on the Sunday of the national championship ceremony, many of these Austinites were so excited, they couldn’t even go get a new tattoo Up on the stage, Governor Rick Perry showed off the pair of sealskin cowboy boots that he’d won off Governor Terminator in their Rose Bowl bet “We beat the hell out of Southern... kneeling on the sideline and gazing at the action on the field, backed by his crewcut corps of earnest faces Much of this book is devoted to that season, the one framed in black and white I was young then, my fascination with Texas-OU was at its zenith, and I was acquainted with some of the players Then as now there’s a certain gallantry of bearing that characterizes the people who actually played in the game... windshield with shoe polish, but wrote it backward so the people inside could read it Then somebody insulted Cronley’s date, and he reluctantly got from his car to defend the honor of his lady Cronley handed his new sport coat to an onlooker, took a punch in the nose, and then watched the onlooker as he took off running with the coat Refuge from the savagery of the Dallas streets was avail- 19 RUNNIN’ WITH THE. .. didn’t know, but they stood in unison and chanted, The queen is a bitch! The queen is a bitch!” Architects designed the building in the style of the École des Beaux-Arts, with a bronze and slate mansard roof and a façade decorated with French Renaissance features in relief There was only one other hotel in the region that came close to approaching the grandeur of the Adolphus, that being the Jackson Hotel... watch in the end zone Yeah, and it’ll be a majestic college football production Heritage, though, and tradition are the elements that fuel this remarkable rivalry The people who will cram into the old Cotton Bowl for the next renewal might be reminded that before 11 RUNNIN’ WITH THE BIG DOGS there was this, there was that—that being the historical elements providing the substance and meaning to the series... alums of Annapolis and West Point running naked through the corridors of the best hotels in Philadelphia and throwing lamps out of the windows That’s the charm of the October Oddness in Dallas Now the great gathering is being threatened by a few popinjays, peckerwoods, and pencil-neck geeks who want to take the thing out of Dallas for reasons that they say involve finance Some people operating within the .