On July 24th we had the day off so we decided to spend the day seeing the sites of Galveston. First we stopped to eat breakfast at Panera Bread. Sister Diamond had never had the pleasure. Go figure! Then on to the Pier 70 where the oil rig museum is located. It was very interesting!!! We were able to walk inside and outside and we watched a movie about how oil is discovered and pumped out of the ocean floor. There were also displays of the different types of rigs, some stationary and others on ships. This was a smaller rig that had been retired.
Next we went to the Great Storm theater to watch the movies about the 1900 hurricane that destroyed a large portion of Galveston island and killed around 6,000 people. They had a book store there so I had to buy a couple of books. One was Isaac's Storm written by the great historical author, Erick Larson, my favorite. The film was about 20 minutes long. We ate pizza at an Italian restaurant across the street while we waited for our boat tour. The boar tour took us out to the bay where we view a cement ship that had seen it's better days. Yes I did say cement and it did float and there was about 40 of them. This one is forever stuck and will probably last like forever or so. There were also dolphins swimming and diving ahead of a container ship. That was pretty cool. I tried to get some pictures of them but they were too fast or my phone camera was too slow. The boat ride was about and hour and pretty OK. You can see just so much water and I'm not a boat lover.
Next we went to see 2 of the mansions that survived the hurricane. One was called the Bishops Palace. It was a self guided tour with listen things so you could learn about the history of the mansion. It had once been a high society show place but was later sold to the Catholic church and a Bishop lived in it. It had beautiful wood carvings and decorations. Here is some info on it:
The Bishop's Palace, also known as Gresham's Castle, is an ornate 19,082 square feet Victorian-style house, located on Broadway and 14th Street in the East End Historic District of Galveston, Texas.
The Gresham mansion was made all of stone, and was sturdy enough to withstand the great hurricane of 1900. The Greshams welcomed hundreds of survivors of the hurricane into their home.[2]
The house was built between 1887 and 1893 by Galveston architect Nicholas J. Clayton for lawyer and politician Walter Gresham, his wife Josephine, and their nine children. In 1923 the Roman Catholic Diocese of Galveston purchased the house, and, situated across the street from the Sacred Heart Church, it served as the residence for Bishop Christopher E. Byrne.[3] After the diocesan offices were moved to Houston, the diocese opened the mansion to the public in 1963, with proceeds from tours being used to help fund the Newman Center, operating in the basement, serving Catholic students at the nearby University of Texas Medical Branch.
The home is estimated to have cost $250,000 at the time. Today its value is estimated at over $5.5 million.
The house is owned by the Galveston Historical Foundation and self-guided tours are available daily. A portion of each admission supports the preservation and restoration of the property.
After we went to the Bishop's Palace we went on a guided tour of the Moody Mansion, the famous financier. The tour guide was great. In person guides are so much better than handle held recorders. I should probably get a book about the Moodys. Here is some info on their house which they did not originally build but bought from a widow who used her children's inheritances to build it and they never spoke to her again because of it. Money, the root of all things miserable.
The Moody Mansion, also known as the Willis-Moody Mansion, is a historic residential building in Galveston, Texas located at 2618 Broadway Street. The thirty-one room Romanesque mansion was completed in 1895. The home is named for William Lewis Moody, Jr., an American financier and entrepreneur in the cotton business who bought the home from Galveston socialite Narcissa Willis. The mansion was added to theNational Register of Historic Places on May 13, 1994. Tours are offered, and the facilities can be rented out for weddings and other events.[2]
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[show]Construction and history[edit]
The mansion was commissioned by Galveston socialite Narcissa Willis in 1893.[3] Throughout her life, Willis had asked her husband, entrepreneur and cotton broker Richard S. Willis, to build a grand home. Willis demurred as he preferred to keep his assets liquid to be distributed among his ten children on his death. After Richard Willis' died in 1892, Narcissa had the home she and her husband shared torn down and began plans to build a more opulent home on the site.[4] For this act, Willis was estranged from her family until her death in 1899.[2][4] Her children never visited the opulent mansion designed to bring them back to Galveston.[3] Willis lived alone in the house with a single housekeeper who was paid $1,000 a year, three times the wages domestics earned at the time.[2]
Willis commissioned an English architect, William H. Tyndall, to design the home. Following the style of Richard Norman Shaw, Tyndall used elements from different cultures and periods, leading to an eclectic appearance. The interiors were designed by Pottier & Stymus, a famous New York firm of the time that also worked for such clients as Thomas Edison, William Rockefeller, and President Ulysses S. Grant.[3]
Upon Narcissa Willis' death in 1899, her daughter Beatrice put the home up for sale.[4] Libbie Moody, who lived in a home nearby the mansion, asked her husband, William Lewis Moody, Jr., to put in a bid for the mansion. After the Hurricane of 1900 devastated Galveston that September, many of the bidders pulled out of the sale. Moody won the mansion for $20,000, a fraction of the mansion's over $100,000 worth. Moody, his wife and four children promptly moved into the home and celebrated their first Christmas at the mansion in 1900.[2]
Members of the Moody family resided in the home until 1986 when it was turned into a historic museum commemorating the Moody family.[2]Hurricanes continue to affect the history of the home. In September 2008, Hurricane Ike lead to the flooding of the basement. Libbie Moody's potting room and the period kitchen were lost.[2] As of July 2014, the basement was opened as the Galveston Children's Museum.[5]
And then after a hot but great day we headed home. Another great adventure in Texas.
Oil Rig Museum
Picture of Peanut Butter Warehouse
Dolphins were swimming and jumping ahead of this ship and it was going pretty fast
The cement ship
It's sitting on a sand bar which is most of Galveston island.
This was a fishing boat. the birds were all crazy on it trying to get the fish.
If you look real close you will see dolphins
Oil rig being serviced and readied for the gulf
Bishops Palace
The piano in this room is just like my old one
Dining room celing
Outside of the Bishops Palace
Moody Mansion
No pictures inside - phone died
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