What the Guinness Book of World Records can do for a small, forgotten Texas town
We build freeways across Texas that bypass small towns. Most of the time those little towns just slowly fade away. Bowie, Texas was one of those towns. Named after Jim Bowie, one of the Alamo fighters for our freedom from Mexico in March of 1836, Bowie was a small farming town in north Texas. Bowie’s city fathers decided to do something to put Bowie back on the travel map, to give people a reason to stop and enjoy their little town. Jim Bowie was known to prefer his hunting knife over his cap and ball pistol that occasionally mis-fired. Bowie knives are quite a collector’s item today. The city decided to commission a giant Bowie knife, large enough to win a Guinness World Record, and mount it in a city park not too far from the freeway. The citizens raised the funds for the knife, it is 20-feet, 6-inches long and weighs 1 1/2 tons. It’s blade is steel, the hilt is brass and the handle is made from the wood of a local Bois d’arc tree. There are people who travel America finding all the World Records and travelers from all over America and the world have been to Bowie to see the knife. It was installed in 2016 and Bowie is quite a destination now, several good restaurants are there, all revitalized by the increase in tourists coming through. They have a big trade days event the second weekend of every month and more people are going to that affair than ever before. If you are ever in Texas on highway 287, take the exit to Bowie, so you can see “The Knife” and eat at Sweet Boy’s Diner, they have the best pancakes around! 😊
And all because of a knife! You are right though, America is so big that you need to be on the road system to keep viable. It doesn't work like that in the UK. It's so small that you are never far away from a traffic queue so to be bypassed is every villages dream! So glad Bowie has brought a living back to town.
Quite an attraction to the town. We have lots of 'big things' sculptures in Australia, ie. the big pineapple, merino, lobster, banana, etc but I don't think we have a big knife.
This is fascinating, LouAnn - What really good thinking on the part of the town to come up with that idea. My husband always talked about the Bowie knife. This site is a great place to showcase this shot.
Wow! That's truly amazing! I do know all about Jim Bowie and his knife but I didn't know there was a Bowie, Texas and I definitely didn't know about their giant Bowie knife. We take Interstate 35 up to Canada every summer so we don't go through Bowie but this year I just might suggest that we take a detour after Fort Worth and take 287 to Bowie. I'm sure that would be a lot of fun! Great capture of this awesome knife! :-)
@gardenfolk@radiogirl@milaniet@365karly1@starlea1@gaylewood Thank you for your wonderful comments and favs. The knife was on the TP and PP this morning. Thank you! @gaylewood We are going to start taking the roads less traveled as much as possible when we travel. There’s so much to see on the backroads! Since we are retired, we have the time, smile.
What a fun shot! And what an interesting story and knife! Looked up where Bowie is... too far for a day trip, but I like to visit the North of Texas one day so I'll add this picture as a fav!
Sometimes all it takes is a little creative thinking and you can revitalize almost anything. Smart town!! Surprisingly- I knew some of that info about the Bowie knife. How I knew it, I don't know!
Thank you all so much for your great comments and favs. The Knife is pretty cool!
Thank you so much for your comments and favs! Lots of things to see and do if you have the time to find them!