DALLAS & FORT WORTH: CULTURE & COWBOYS

DALLAS & FORT WORTH: CULTURE & COWBOYS Story and photography by Margaret & Eric Anderson
At Disney World, when our guide asked the crowd, "Where's everyone from?' someone cried, "Texas." The guide shouted back, "Welcome to the United States, y'all!'
	To be sure, Texas is different. Its citizens boast "Texas is a state of mind like a whole other country, with more thrills than Disneyland, more music than Nashville, more shopping than New York." Could be. It sure seems so in the 27 communities that form the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex.

	Fort Worth has world-class museums, such as its gift from a local newspaper magnate, the Amon Carter, which house masterpieces of American art. A similar present from an oil and real estate entrepreneur, the Kimbell Art Museum is often called the best small museum in the country. And in the city next door, the Dallas Museum of Art thrills its visitors with expansive exhibits that meander through each continent's art from its very beginnings to the present day.


In Irving, just west of Dallas, an impressive Art Center encourages emerging artists with two state-of-the-art performance halls, four art galleries, and 14 performing arts groups. The Metroplex has two performance halls worth a visit in themselves. The Bass Performance Hall in Fort Worth was a present to the city from the Bass brothers, millionaires whose careers began when Uncle Sid Richardson gave each of the four young men a gift of $2 million. In Dallas, the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center, designed by I. M. Pei, was completed thanks to a $12 million gift from Ross Perot.

Dallas can be a bit formal, and you may have to hunt for the famed Texas charm. On the other hand, just 30 miles away, Fort Worth revels in its "Cow Town" image. Will Rogers once said, "Fort Worth is where the West begins and Dallas where the East peters out." Says C. Greg Staley, associate director of communications for the Fort Worth Convention & Visitors Bureau: "We didn't knock down our past and build skyscrapers as every other city was doing in the 1970s. We've kept the spirit of the 'Old West' and our pioneer heritage."
	Downtown Fort Worth took on a new life when the Worthington Hotel opened and the Caravan of Dreams Jazz Club moved into Sundance Square. An AMC multiplex continued a revitalization now completed by the Bass Performance Hall whose walls bear carved 15-ton angels.

Accompanying the Kimbell and the Amon Carter museums in Fort Worth's so-called "cultural center" are the Museum of Science and Natural History and the Will Rogers Memorial Center with its year-round events. The Stockyards, now a national historic district, house some of Fort Worth's best-known places: the White Elephant Saloon -- and the Cattleman's Steak House across the street; Billy Bob's Texas, the world's largest honky-tonk; the Cowboy Coliseum built in 1908 to be the first indoor rodeo in the United States; the Stockyards Hotel, where Bonnie and Clyde once stayed; and the Tarantula Train drawn by an 1896 steam locomotive that pulls turn-of-the century Victorian carriages 21 miles north each day to Grapevine's historic district.