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Seat of Empire: The Embattled Birth of Austin, Texas, by Jeffrey Stuart Kerr, Texas Tech University Press, Lubbock, 2013, $39.95

Before Austin, Texas, earned the title of state capital, the government of the Republic of Texas had “assembled at seven different locations in nine years,” notes author Jeffrey Stuart Kerr. In spite of that, he writes, the state of Texas “has had only one seat of government in its 161-year history.” The extraordinary circumstances, people and political machinations behind its selection are the subject of this thoroughly researched, rewarding book by a noted Texas doctor and historian.

The book delves straight into the drama of the era, as politicians of the time argued—sometimes physically—the merits of establishing a capital on the relative fringe of westward expansion vs. maintaining a more eastern presence. Personifying those opposing points of view were Sam Houston (representing the eastern faction) and Mirabeau Lamar, who served together respectively as president and vice president of the pre-state republic despite their vehement dislike for one another. Lamar later served as Texas president, though following in Houston’s ostentatious footsteps was an admittedly tough road.

Perhaps more at stake even than the location of the capital was an ideology of how the West would form. Houston advocated statehood for the bold republic and argued that the eastern part of the state was a more logical choice for the seat of government, given that it was home to the bulk of the population. But Lamar, who stubbornly held on to the dream of a thriving Texian nation extending to the Pacific Ocean, believed the capital should be more central to that future vision. He chose a place called Waterloo during a buffalo hunt in 1837.

In the end both would have their way, and each would have a town named for him. Texas would become a state, and Austin (first called Waterloo but shortly renamed after the republic’s first secretary of state) would become its capital. But while Houston (the city) went on to flourish, honoring the memory of its namesake leader, Lamar (a town founded in 1839 on the channel entrance to Copano Bay) suffered a less dignified fate. Although prosperous in its early days due to its port location, it was bombed into near oblivion by the Union Navy in 1864. Today just over 600 people live within its unincorporated boundaries, and Lamar (the man) has faded in popular memory.

Martin A. Bartels