10/10/2026
The Texas Quote of the Day comes from the great J. Frank Dobie and is in regards to the lost gold/silver mine of San Saba:
" What the Golden Fleece was to the Greeks or what El Dorado - the Gilded Man - has been to South America, the lost mines on the San Saba and Llano rivers in Texas have been to all that part of the United States once owned by Spain. The story of these mines is a cycle made up of a thousand cantos. Housed mechanics, preachers, teachers, doctors, lawyers, earth-treading farmers, and home-staying women, as well as roaming cowboys, rangers, outlaws, and miners, have told the strange story --- and believed it. It is a story of yesterday, as obsolete as the claiming of continents by priority in flag-hoisting; it is a story of today, as realistic as the salt of the earth; it is also a story of tomorrow as fantastic and romantic as all the hopes of man. Through it history walks unabashed and in it fancy sets no limit to extravagance.
Sometimes the name of the fabled source of wealth is Los Almagres; sometimes, Las Amarillas; again, La Mina de las Iguanas, or lizard mine, from the fact that the ore is said to have been found in chunks called iguanas (lizards); oftener the name is simply The Lost San Saba mine or the Lost Bowie Mine. In seeking it, generations of men have disemboweled mountains, drained lakes, and turned rivers out of their courses. It has been found --- and lost --- in many places under many conditions. It is here; it is there; it is nowhere. Generally it is silver; sometimes it is gold. Sometimes it is in a cave; sometimes in water; again on top of a mountain. Now it is not a mine at all but an immense storage of bullion. It changes its place like will-o-the-wisp and it has more changes and shapes than Jupiter assumed in playing lover."
---- J. Frank Dobie, Coronado's Children, 1958
Shown here: J. Frank Dobie in 1943, Austin. Taken by Neal Douglass. Courtesy the Austin History Center, Austin Public Library
