{"id":359884,"date":"2026-07-03T12:10:43","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T12:10:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/359884\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T12:10:43","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T12:10:43","slug":"texas-historian-reacts-to-chrons-most-influential-texans-list","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/359884\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas historian reacts to Chron’s most influential Texans list"},"content":{"rendered":"

History is always watching the choices we make. One of the challenges of studying Texas history<\/a> is recognizing that every generation decides who gets remembered\u2014and who gets left behind.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Naturally, not everyone will agree with the final rankings\u2014and that’s part of the point. History invites debate.<\/p>\n

As any historian will tell you, historical figures are rarely viewed through a single lens. Depending on the era, discipline or community you’re looking through, some names will inevitably feel overlooked while others seem over-represented. That was one of the first things University of Houston historian Ra\u00fal Ramos noticed about the top-10 of our Texas 250 list, which we shared with him ahead\u00a0of the public release.<\/p>\n

“As a historian specializing in early Texas, the list appears light on pre-twentieth century figures (pre-WWII to be precise),” Ramos said.<\/p>\n

“The absence of pre-Texas Revolution representation indicates historians’ work to make those connections is cut out for us,” he said.<\/p>\n

Ramos pointed to figures like Cherokee leader Diwal’li (unranked), also known as Chief Bowles, as an example of an influential Texan whose story deserved wider recognition. Likewise, he said,\u00a0civil rights attorney Gus Garcia and journalist Jovita Idar reflect a longer tradition of Texans shaping the state beyond elected office.<\/p>\n

He saw a similar pattern in the arts.<\/p>\n

“The inclusion of Willie (Nelson),\u00a0Selena (Quintanilla) and\u00a0Beyonc\u00e9 (Knowles) have left an indelible mark on popular music, justifying their\u00a0mononymous recognition,” Ramos said. “Yet the artistic impact of Texans extends into other artistic areas that have influenced national culture … our bias for the importance of our present moment seems to overshadow a longer tradition that laid the foundation for our culture.”<\/p>\n

To be true, there are older Texas musicians, artists and creatives on the list\u2014including, for example,\u00a0 Chicano author\u00a0Am\u00e9rico Paredes (No. 91), bluesman Sam “Lightnin'” Hopkins (No. 100) and visual artist and writer Tom Lea (No. 70)\u2014but they’re further down from the top-10.<\/p>\n

Perhaps that’s the real value of lists like these. They aren’t meant to end the conversation; they’re meant to start one. After all, history isn’t static. Every generation revisits the past, asks new questions and uncovers people whose stories had been forgotten. Two-hundred and fifty years from now, Texans may look back at this list and remember those who left their mark\u2014and argue more about who was left out. Only time will tell.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"History is always watching the choices we make. One of the challenges of studying Texas history is recognizing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":359885,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[118182,1836,1704,85744,56,58,57],"class_list":["post-359884","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-houston","tag-chron-texas250","tag-chronnews","tag-chronstaff","tag-chrontexas","tag-houston","tag-houston-headlines","tag-houston-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=359884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359884\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/359885"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=359884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=359884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=359884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}