Mount Pleasant Tribune (Mount Pleasant, Tex.), Vol. 145, No. 17, Ed. 1 Saturday, February 2, 2019 Page: 4 of 10
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PERSPECTIVES
Page 4 • TribNow.com
February 2,2019
Market outlook for 2019: Uncertainty is certain
ByTRACY FARR
Treasure hunter urges Indian genocide
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Ms
Miranda Oglesby, Reporter
miranda@tribnow.com
Mark Henry, Publisher
mark@tribnow.com
Tracy Farr, Reporter
tracy@tribnow.com
Keilani Cheek, Bookkeeper,
Classifieds, Circulation
kcheek@tribnow.com
This article was written by Edward Jones for use by your
local Edward Jones Financial Advisor.
Leslie Brosnan, Advertising
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ke
y .
of the eighteenth century, around the time his native
country was conquered by Napoleon and disappeared
forever from the map of Europe. That would have made
Dupont between 50 or 60 years old, when he wandered
into Texas in the 1770 s.
What is known of the footloose Flemish comes from
his diary. Although the journal begins in the summer
of 1787, it is clear the author had been in Texas for ten
years or longer and knew his way around the Spanish
province better than most Europeans.
Dupont made his living as a trader with a clientele
that included most of the Indian tribes in the eastern
half of modern Texas. A natural talent for languages
enabled him to communicate with his customers, and
a strong instinct for survival kept him alive in a very
dangerous environment.
Trading was, however, merely his day job. Dupont
was at heart a treasure hunter obsessed with the silver
mines of San Saba supposedly “lost” after the Lipan
Apaches destroyed the mission and garrison of the same
name in 1758.
Dupont went looking for the missing motherlode in
1788 with two guides, a Spaniard called Pacheco and an
Indian whose name he did not bother to record. They
left San Antonio on Mar. 1 and worked their way north-
west toward the San Saba River.
For 11 days, the journey was uneventful, but on the
12th the trio came upon an enormous war party. The
terrified travelers cowered in the brush as 400 Coman-
ches passed in review bound for another battle with
their ancient enemies the Apaches.
Dupont and his companions reached the ruins of the
San Saba fort and mission near present-day Menard on
Apr. 3. After a two-day rest, they started searching the
countryside for signs of the abandoned mines.
look for opportunities and
keep a long-term perspec-
tive within our investment
portfolios. Consider these
actions for 2019:
Be prepared for vola-
tility. As mentioned, many
of the same factors that led
to the market upheavals of
For the second time in
less than a year, Alexander
Dupont set out on Feb. 2,
1789 in search of the sto-
ried silver mines of San
Saba.
The French-speaking ad-
venturer was born in Flan-
ders in the second decade
Financial
Focus
Provided by
David Patterson
Financial Advisor
This Week in
exas History
y BARTEE HAILE
Published Wednesdays and Saturdays, plus
daily online at tribnow.com
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The sudden appear-
ance on Apr. 17 of 200
warriors a short distance
from their camp scared
the native trailblazer out
of his wits. The Indian
ran for his life and did
not stop until he arrived
safe and sound in San
" U’Digitalserices
To say the financial
markets were a bit bumpy
in 2018 may be an under-
statement. The S&P 500
was down 6.2 percent for
the year, the first time this
key index fell since 2008,
during the financial crisis.
So what can you anticipate
I The View
1 From A Farr
2018 are still with us, along with the impact of the par-
tial government shutdown - so don’t be surprised to see
continued volatility. The more you’re prepared for market
turbulence, the less startled you’ll be when it arrives.
Stay diversified. At any given time, different finan-
cial assets may move in different directions: stocks up,
bonds down, or vice versa. To help dilute risk and take
advantage of different opportunities, you should main-
tain a broadly diversified portfolio containing stocks, in-
ternational stocks, bonds, government securities and so
on. You may need to rebalance your portfolio to maintain
an appropriate proportion of each asset class, based on
your risk tolerance and long-term goals. Keep in mind,
though, that while diversification can reduce the effects
of volatility on your portfolio, it can’t guarantee profits or
protect against all losses.
Take a long-term perspective. It can be disconcert-
ing to see several-hundred point drops in the stock mar-
ket. But you can look past short-term events, especially
if your most important financial target - a comfortable
retirement - is still years or decades away. By keeping
your focus on the long term, you can make investment
decisions based on your objectives - not your emotions.
If 2019 continues to be volatile, you’ll need to stay pre-
pared and make the right moves - so you can be confi-
dent that you did everything you could to keep moving
toward your financial goals.
in 2019? And what investment moves should you make?
Let’s review the causes for last year’s market volatility.
Generally speaking, uncertainty was a major culprit. Un-
certainty about tariffs, uncertainty about the continued
trade dispute with China, uncertainty about Brexit - they
all combined to make the markets nervous. Furthermore,
the Federal Reserve raised interest rates four times, and
even though rates remain low by historical standards,
the increases caused some concern, as higher borrowing
costs can eventually crimp the growth prospects for busi-
nesses.
And now that we’re into 2019, these same uncertainties
remain, so markets are likely to remain volatile. Although
the Fed has indicated it maybe more cautious with regard
to new rate hikes, there are indications of slower growth
ahead, particularly in China, the world’s second-largest
economy. And after strong 2018 earnings growth, helped
by the corporate tax cuts, corporate earnings may grow
more slowly - and, as always, earnings are a key driver of
stock prices.
Nonetheless, the U.S. economy is showing enough
strength that a recession does not appear to be on the
horizon, which is also likely to be the case globally - and
that should be good news, because an extended “bear”
market typically does need to be fueled by a recession.
Ultimately, the projected continued growth of the U.S.
economy and the possible resolution of some uncertain-
ties could help markets rebound.
As investors, we cannot control the everyday ups and
downs in the markets, but we can control our decisions,
7^
TEXAS PRESS
ASSOCIATION
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Mt. Pleasant Tribune ‘
Antonio.
Two weeks later, it was the townspeople’s turn to be
frightened. Dupont was puzzled by the wide-eyed re-
ception until someone explained that the defector had
told everybody he was dead.
Dupont spent eight months making ready for his next
treasure hunt. He had plenty of company on his Febru-
ary 1789 expedition -- a dozen laborers, four Comanche
guides, an interpreter, a cashier and a mule train loaded
down with trinkets and supplies.
A month out of San Antonio and already short four
helpers and one guide, Dupont was surrounded by a
hundred Comanches, who mistook him for a Spaniard.
But at the last moment they recognized the trader and
escorted him to their principal village.
Despite a warm welcome from the Comanche lead-
er he described as the “Grand Chief,” Dupont picked a
fight with his host over the recent killing of four Span-
iards. The chief gave his side of the story but refused to
be cross-examined by the white guest and cut short the
conversation by saying, “This is finished and we won’t
utter another word.”
Dupont and the Comanches parted company in ear-
ly May. On the 26th, according to an excited entry in
his diary, he found the elusive silver mines. He headed
for the Mexican interior with all the ore the mule train
could carry anxious to stake his claim.
But the riches somehow slipped through his fingers,
probably because Spanish officials believed the mines
belonged to the crown and not to a no-account foreign-
er. Dupont pressed his case but soon was sidetracked by
a new project — a secret plan for the elimination of an
entire tribe of Texas Indians.
Why Dupont had it in for the Karankawas is still a
mystery. But his hatred of them was so fierce that he
petitioned the viceroy for their wholesale slaughter.
“These same Indians are very susceptible to drinking,”
Dupont wrote in his chilling proposal, “and once they
are in a drunken stupor it would be easy to carry out the
destruction of the entire nation without any fuss, partic-
ularly if in the same drink there is mixed some ingredi-
ent capable of putting them to sleep forever.”
The viceroy had no love for the Karankawas, but
wholesale genocide struck him as rash and excessive.
He never answered Dupont’s bizarre letter and rebuffed
his repeated requests for an audience.
Things went from bad to worse for Dupont after that.
He tried to return to Texas, but the authorities demand-
ed that he to stay put in Mexico where they could keep
close tabs on him. When the order came from Spain to
detain all Frenchmen and confiscate their property, he
was one of the first thrown in prison.
By 1803 Alexander Dupont was old, sick and out of
his mind. He murdered his best friend and committed
suicide by sticking a musket in his mouth and pulling
the trigger with his big toe.
Bartee Haile welcomes your comments, questions
and suggestions at haile@pdq.net or 1912 Meadow
Creek Dr., Pearland, TX 77581
It's the thought that counts
Oh, what a frustrating thing to wake up in the middle
of the night and realize you have practically no opinions
on a plethora of topics. You wonder, is this a dream?
A nightmare? And do I even know what “plethora”
means?
Thus was the situation I found myself in early Thurs-
day morning (at exactly 3:27 a.m.); me, warm under
thick blankets, wishing for just a few more hours of
shuteye, my mind ricocheting thoughts off the inside of
my skull, pondering things like:
So, who's going to win the Super Bowl? The New England
Patriots or the Los Angeles Rams? Do I really care? It’s 3:27
in the morning. Football for me was Tom Landry, Tex
Schramm, the Doomsday Defense, “Roger the Dodg-
er” Staubach making a comeback win against the Colts;
Troy Aikman, Michael Irvin and Emmitt Smith, back
to back Super Bowl wins - and I guess the Rams, just
because I’m glad to hear they’re back in LA.
(I won’t be watching the Super Bowl. I’m much more
into Cricket and Tiddlywinks.)
We've been taught the Earth is round, but is it really flat? Yes,
if you look at a map of the Earth, it is as flat as the table
it’s sitting on. Yes, if you’re driving west to El Paso in the
middle of the summer, Earth seems excruciatingly flat.
And yes, you can have a flat tire, a flat stomach, flat feet,
be flat on your back or fall flat on your face - but when
you fall, you’ll be falling flat on top of a mostly-round
Earth.
( And now it’s 3:32. Why am I even giving “flat-earth”
a thought? I could be sound asleep, catching Zzz’s - but
where do I begin?)
Speaking of, what really happened in "The Beginning"? In
the beginning, the universe was nothing, but half a wink
later the universe became everything. Matter was soon
clumping together to form chunks, and these chunks
clumped together to form blobs and globs, which even-
tually turned into massive stars like Katherine Hepburn
and Humphrey Bogart who shined brightly in their
own time then slowly faded away.
Not long after (relatively speaking), massive stars ex-
ploded sending shrapnel through nearby gas clouds,
forming more chunks, blobs and globs, and that’s how
our very own sun and planets were formed. It’s hard to
say what happened next because nobody was around to
tweet about it.
Maybe a girl amoeba fell in love with a boy amoeba
and they had little baby amoebas who multiplied like
rabbits until they were rabbits, then other amoebas in-
vented the calendar and declared a day of rest which
was a good thing because all those amoebas were get-
ting really, really tired of multiplying.
Maybe the first trees were just grass, and they grew
into trees to defend themselves from being eaten by all
those rabbits. Maybe some of the grass remained grass
because they didn’t believe in evolution and ended up
getting eaten alive, which really sucked for them, but
nobody cared. They were just grass.
It was all Copernicus’ fault, of course. He threw us
off-center; then Newton gave us gravity to keep our ap-
ples from flying off the table; Faraday inspired Whit-
man to sing the body electric; Darwin evolutionized the
meaning of life; Pasteur washed his hands of it all; and
Einstein gave us relatives we wish we didn’t have.
And I’m still not asleep. I guess I might as well get up
and fix the coffee.)
Yes, indeed. It’s a frustrating thing to wake up in the
middle of the night and realize you have practically no
opinions on a plethora of topics, your mind ricocheting
thoughts off the inside of your skull until you remem-
ber: Plethora, a noun that means “a large or excessive
amount of (something).”
As in “can’t go to sleep” thoughts.
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Mount Pleasant Tribune (Mount Pleasant, Tex.), Vol. 145, No. 17, Ed. 1 Saturday, February 2, 2019, newspaper, February 2, 2019; Mount Pleasant, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1429225/m1/4/: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Mount Pleasant Public Library.