The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 68, July 1964 - April, 1965 Page: 391

Book Reviews

is once again impressed upon the reader. Daniels raises the ques-
tion of Sam Houston's involvement in the selection of his name-
sake city as the capital, but he makes no judgment concerning
the president's personal financial benefit, if any. The reasons
for Lamar's desire to remove the capital to Austin are inade-
quately treated. Although the story of the "Archives War" is
retold, the author neglects the frontier and political considera-
tions, among others, which dictated removal.
Quite a gallery of renowned individuals came to Texas Avenue
at Main Street. Such disparate personalities as Jefferson Davis and
U. S. Grant, the leading ornithologist, James John Audubon; and
Presidents McKinley, Taft, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Eisenhower,
and Kennedy. Anson Jones came there to commit suicide, and
William Marsh Rice and Jesse Jones to add to their financial em-
pires. The celebrated actor, Edwin Booth, John Glenn, "a $75-
per week warbler named Perry Como," and many others also
graced the locale Daniels writes about. Much of the latter part
of the book deals exclusively with the growth and development
of the Rice Hotel on the site originally occupied by the Capitol
Building of the Republic of Texas. In this connection, the re-
viewer learned for the first time of the song, "Rice Hotel Blues."
In a compilation of this sort there are bound to be some short-
comings. Daniels seemed to lose enthusiasm for his subject once
the capital was removed from Houston. In the modern period,
the author has given little more than a recounting of what tran-
spired at the Rice Hotel, the details of which are really not too
significant for the study of Texas history. These deficiencies, how-
ever, do not destroy the general value of the work. The illustra-
tions add to the tenor of the book and are well chosen. Certainly
the most poignant is the picture of President and Mrs. Kennedy
on the fateful Texas tour of November, 1963.
STANLEY E. SIEGEL
University of Houston
Let There Be Light; a History of Guadalupe Valley Electric Co-
operative. By Allen H. Chessher. San Antonio (Naylor Com-
pany), 1964. Pp. 98. $4.95.
Let There Be Light, a brief volume which discusses the first
quarter century of an electric cooperative in the Guadalupe

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