Portal:Texas/Selected article archive

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Dell Inc., an American computer hardware company based in Round Rock, Texas, develops, manufactures, supports, and markets a wide range of personal computers, servers, data storage devices, network switches, personal digital assistants (PDAs), software, computer peripherals, and more. As of 2006 it employs more than 63,700 people worldwide and manufactures more computers than any other organization in the world. According to the Forbes 500 2005 list, Dell ranks as the 28th-largest company in the United States by revenue. In 2005, Fortune magazine ranked Dell as No. 1 on its annual list of the most-admired companies in the United States, displacing Wal-Mart.

Michael Dell, while still a student at the University of Texas at Austin, founded the company as PC's Limited [sic] with just $1000, in his room at Jester Center, an on-campus dorm, in 1984. The startup aimed to sell IBM-compatible computers built from stock components. Michael Dell founded the company in the belief that by selling personal computer systems directly to customers, PC's Limited could best understand their needs and provide the most effective computing solutions to meet those needs.

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Upcoming/Suggested

 * Amarillo, Texas
 * Southwest Airlines
 * Texas Ranger Division
 * Texas Constitution
 * Austin-Bergstrom International Airport
 * Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport
 * Alamo Mission in San Antonio
 * Bevo (mascot)
 * Bluebonnet
 * Roy Bean
 * Texas longhorn (cattle)
 * Big Bend National Park
 * San Antonio Missions National Historical Park

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The Texas State Capitol, located in Austin, Texas, is the fourth building to serve as the seat of Texas government. Originally designed by Elijah E. Myers, it was constructed from 1882-1888, and an extension and a major renovatinon were completed in the 1990s, with the extension being completely below ground. The building was recognized as a National Historic Landmark in 1986. Construction of the capitol building was funded through an article in the state constitution, adopted February 15, 1876, which authorized the sale of public lands for the purpose. The builders of the capitol were paid with three million acres (12,000 km²) of land in the Texas panhandle; this tract later became the XIT Ranch. The cornerstone for the building was laid on March 2, 1885. The original plan for the capitol called for it to be constructed from limestone quarried within the state; however there was some concern that the available limestone would be of variable quality. Hearing of the problem, the owners of Granite Mountain near Marble Falls offered to donate to the state free of charge the necessary amount of pink granite as an alternative. More...

Houston is the largest city in the state of Texas and the fourth-largest in the United States. The city covers more than 600 square miles (1,600 km²) and is the county seat of Harris County&mdash;the third-most populous in the country. As of the 2004 U.S. Census estimate, Houston had a total population of more than 2 million. The city is at the heart of the Houston–Sugar Land–Baytown metropolitan area, the largest cultural and economic center of the Gulf Coast region and the seventh-largest metropolitan area in the U.S. with a population of 5.3 million in 10 counties.

Houston is world-renowned for its energy (particularly oil) and aeronautics industries, and for its ship channel. The area is also the world's leading center for building oilfield equipment. The Port of Houston ranks first in the country in international commerce and is the sixth-largest port in the world. Second only to New York City in Fortune 500 headquarters, Houston is the seat of the internationally-renowned Texas Medical Center, which contains the world's largest concentration of research and healthcare institutions.

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The Second Battle of Sabine Pass took place on September 8, 1863, and was the result of a Union expedition into Confederate-controlled Texas during the American Civil War. It has often been credited as the most one-sided Confederate victory during the conflict.

During the summer of 1863, the president of Mexico, Benito Juárez, was overthrown and replaced by the emperor Maximilian, whose allegiance was with France. France had been openly sympathetic to the Confederate States of America earlier in the war, but had never matched its sympathy with diplomatic action. Now that a French government existed just south of the Rio Grande, the Confederates hoped to establish a fruitful route of entry for much-needed matériel.

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Dallas is the third-most-populous city in the state of Texas and the ninth-most-populous in the United States. The city is also large in geographic area as it covers 385 square miles (997 km²) and is the county seat of Dallas County. Dallas is one of 11 U.S. global cities as it is ranked "Gamma World City" by the Globalization and World Cities Study Group & Network.

As of the 2000 U.S. Census, Dallas had a total population of 1.1 million (though a 2006 estimate placed the population at more than 1.26 million .) The city is the main cultural and economic center of the Dallas–Fort Worth–Arlington metropolitan area (colloquially referred to as Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex), which is the fifth-largest metropolitan area in the U.S. with a population of 5.7 million in 12 counties. The 16-county metropolitan area designated by the North Central Texas Council of Governments had a population of 6.2 million in 2006.

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The Galveston Hurricane of 1900 made landfall on the city of Galveston, Texas, on September 8, 1900. It had estimated winds of 135 miles per hour (215 km/h) at landfall, making it a Category 4 storm on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale.

The hurricane caused great loss of life. The death toll has been estimated to be between 6,000 and 12,000 individuals, depending on whether one counts casualties from the city of Galveston itself, the larger island, or the region as a whole. The number most cited in official reports is 8,000, giving the storm the third-highest number of casualties of any Atlantic hurricane, after the Great Hurricane of 1780, and 1998's Hurricane Mitch. The Galveston Hurricane of 1900 is to date the deadliest natural disaster ever to strike the United States. By contrast, the second-deadliest storm to strike the United States, the 1928 Okeechobee Hurricane, caused approximately 2,500 deaths, and the deadliest storm of recent times, Hurricane Katrina, has caused approximately 1,600 deaths.

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Known as the Rio Grande in the United States and as the Río Bravo (or, more formally, the Río Bravo del Norte) in Mexico, the river, 3,034 km (1,885 mi) long, rises in the San Juan Mountains of Colorado, USA, flows through the San Luis Valley, then south into New Mexico through Albuquerque and Las Cruces to El Paso, Texas, on the U.S.–Mexico border. A major tributary, Rio Conchos,enters at Presidio, below El Paso and supplies most of the water in the 2,019 km (1,254 mi) Texas border segment.

The river has, since 1845, marked the boundary between Mexico and the United States from the twin cities of El Paso, Texas, and Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, to the Gulf of Mexico. As such, it was across this river that Texan slaves fled when seeking their freedom, aided by Mexico's liberal colonization policies and abolitionist stance.

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Marshall is a city in the U.S. state of Texas, located near the Louisiana and Arkansas borders in the Ark-La-Tex region. As of the 2000 U.S. Census, Marshall had a total population of 23,935. It is the county seat of Harrison County.

Marshall is a major cultural and educational center in Northeast Texas. The city is known for its Civil War, railroad, and civil rights movement history, for holding one of the largest light festivals in the United States, the Wonderland of Lights, and, as the self-proclaimed Pottery Capital of the World, for its sizable pottery industry. It is also known variously as the Cultural Capital of East Texas, the Gateway of Texas, the Athens of Texas, and the City of Seven Flags.

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