✧ Fort Worth, early in the 1970s, framed by the Water Gardens. COURTESY OF THE FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION, SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON LIBRARIES, ARLINGTON, TEXAS, AR 406 1-31-39. C HAPTER 8 THE “METROPLEX” 1970-1979 For many Americans, the Seventies sat smack-dab at the buckle of what heritage. “Malaise?” Not here, partner, not in represented a time of “malaise.” Even demographers were beginning to call the the city “Where the West Begins!” President Jimmy Carter intimated as much. “Sunbelt,” the swath of air-conditioned In 1971 all of North Texas at last The decade certainly had its lowlights, from states that suddenly appealed to jaded celebrated the victory of bagging a major Richard Nixon resigning in disgrace, to the Northerners and others looking for brighter league franchise. With the announcement U.S. pulling out of Vietnam. To describe the prospects. The Seventies also presented an that the Washington Senators were headed for condition of the economy, pundits created a opportune time for civic and business the nearby city of Arlington, baseball fans in new word”—“stagflation”—an unsettling leaders in Fort Worth to join their the Panther City talked about a return to the combination of stagnation and inflation that counterparts in Dallas. Together they glory days of the Cats and saw visions of set orthodox Keynesian theory on its ear. transformed an old rivalry into an alliance American League pennants. The Star-Telegram Then, there was the energy crisis, that benefited all of North Texas. In the predicted that the Senators, who would be characterized by long lines at gas stations. process, developers began to revive going by a new name yet to be determined, By contrast, Fort Worth seemed almost to downtown Fort Worth and discovered a “could be revered like Fort Worth’s finest of exist in another America. The Panther City bankable mystique in their Cowtown yesteryear—Clarence “Big Boy” Kraft and 126 ✧ THE NEW FRONTIER staffers who gave the alter ego Strangers ample coverage, complete with box scores and pho- tographs. Even the New York Times and world news anchor Walter Cronkite picked up on the short-lived sensation. Capping the two- week season was a “live” broadcast of the 12- 8 title win over the California Angels. Despite so many disappointments, there were nevertheless some precious moments to savor. The first sellout on June 27, 1973, provided the decade’s high water mark, courtesy of eighteen-year-old pitcher David Clyde. His one-hit victory over the Minnesota Twins came just twenty days after his high school career ended at suburban Westchester outside of Houston. Hailed as the savior of the franchise, he soon threw out his arm and found himself struggling in the minor leagues, while the Rangers returned to grappling with an omnipresent lineup of the same old diamond-demons. ✧ ✧ Other issues and episodes with roots in Former Boston Red Sox Hall-of-Famer Ted Williams Eighteen-year-old David Clyde, not even three weeks out earlier decades also played out during the appears as if he might be wondering what he has gotten of high school, stands on the mound in front of the Seventies. As the Vietnam War wound to a himself into as he accepts a pair of cowboy boots outfitted Rangers’ first sellout crowd. He rewarded them by close, five crewmembers of a downed with baseball cleats. pitching a one-hitter against the Minnesota Twins. Carswell B-52 returned to Fort Worth in 1973 COURTESY OF THE TEXAS RANGERS BASEBALL CLUB. COURTESY OF THE TEXAS RANGERS BASEBALL CLUB. from captivity at a Hanoi prison. Unlike most other veterans who came back unapplauded, Jake Atz, who led the Cats on the field and fictitious “Fort Worth Strangers” claimed a the POWs stopped over at Sheppard AFB in Paul LaGrave and W. K. Stripling, who Western Division championship. The light- Wichita Falls, where about two thousand masterminded the city into an exciting hearted ruse was the creation of Star-Telegram cheering well-wishers and tearful family baseball town.” The new lineup would include Cy Young winner Denny McLain and longball hitter Frank Howard, along with their manager, Hall-of-Famer Ted Williams. A players’ strike delayed the 1972 season, but when the recently christened Texas Rangers finally hit the home field against the Angels on April 21—San Jacinto Day—it seemed to be worth the wait. First baseman Frank Howard inaugurated the new era with a four-hundred-foot homerun in the first inning. The promising beginning soon turned sour, however, and when the season ended, the Rangers were looking up from the cellar, 38 ½ games out of first place. After the disastrous debut, Ted Williams called it quits. The following season, manag- er Whitey Herzog would be the next in a long line of helmsmen who came to town with impressive resumes and promises of pennants. Yet none could deliver, and the Rangers became the laughingstock of the American League. “Did you hear the one about the man who took his wife to panty- hose night?” went one joke. “The women’s ✧ hosiery got more runs than the Rangers.” Fort Worth was not a hotbed of antiwar protest, but with the Vietnam War still raging in 1970, this group of about two The closest thing to a pennant in North hundred marchers made their way through downtown for a rally at Burnett Park. Texas came during the 1979 season, when the COURTESY OF THE FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION, SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON LIBRARIES, ARLINGTON, TEXAS, AR 406 1-20-41. CHAPTER 8 ✧ 127 members greeted them. On the racial front, Fort Worth during the decade would elect African Americans and Hispanics to the school board, the city council, and the municipal court—again, with little self-con- gratulation. Both the Metropolitan Black Chamber of Commerce and the Fort Worth Mexican American Chamber of Commerce got their starts in the Seventies as well. Sally Rand, from an even earlier era, stepped back into the spotlight briefly in 1976, fans in hand. Although on the long ✧ side of seventy, she took the stage at Casa Edward Guinn, Fort Worth’s first black city councilman, confers with Sharkey Stovall (left), Watt Kemble, Jr. (right), and del Sol, still adept at teasing the audience Howard McMahan (back to camera). with flashes of the legendary body that had COURTESY OF THE FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION, SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON LIBRARIES, so captivated audiences at the Frontier ARLINGTON, TEXAS, AR 406 1-30-31A. Centennial. Speculating that she had gone to packing her flesh into a body suit, one young woman in the crowd jeered to her tablemate: “At her age, you can bet she’s not really working nude behind those fans.” Backstage, columnist Jack Gordon passed on the remark to the dancer and gathered the gumption to ask her whether it was true. Rand just smiled. Allowing a lace robe to fall to the floor, she retorted with her own query: “What do you think?” Standing before him, “completely bare,” Gordon gaped, “was one of the world’s most famous bodies,” still “flawless” in his estimation. The Cowtown date would be one of her last appearances. Later in the year Sally Rand died of heart fail- ure at a Los Angeles hospital. Nothing, however, marked the passing of ✧ time more than the fiery purge of the vacant For all the good intentions of integration, one unforeseen consequence proved to be destructive of the African-American Armour complex in 1971. The long-tottering community—the closing of traditionally black schools. Principal Walter Day of the historic I. M. Terrell High School is Swift plant had just closed its own doors, pictured here at the end of the 1972-73 academic year, after which the school closed its doors. COURTESY OF THE FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION, SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON LIBRARIES, ARLINGTON, TEXAS, FWST 6397, 31A, 6-2-73. ✧ Fire engulfed the vacant Armour plant in August 1971. The spectacular inferno signaled the end of the meatpacking era in Fort Worth. LEFT IMAGE COURTESY OF THE FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION, SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON LIBRARIES, ARLINGTON, TEXAS, AR 406 1-23-43. RIGHT IMAGE COURTESY OF THE FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION, SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON LIBRARIES, ARLINGTON, TEXAS, AR 406 1-23-44. 128 ✧ THE NEW FRONTIER leaving the packing plants a near ghost town. ly sneaked onto the grounds to repossess A wrecking crew that had taken Armour’s six some plants. The man testified that he saw floors down to the second level provided the man in black, and that it was definitely about the only activity. Somehow the remain- not T. Cullen Davis. After deliberating for ing wood and cork insulation caught a spark. two days, the jurors stunned the trial’s fol- By the time the station house received the lowers with a verdict of “not guilty.” first alarm at about 11 p.m., the blaze had Nine months later T. Cullen Davis was already spread out of control, tapping into the back in the news, this time accused of decades-old accumulation of lard and grease arranging a mass murder-for-hire. His plan, that had saturated the plant’s thick floors and much of it caught on tape by FBI agents, tar- walls. More than a hundred firemen were on geted fifteen people, among them Priscilla, the scene by midnight, futilely pouring water the judge in their divorce case, and even one into the unquenchable inferno.