Jan. 5, 2012 - Born in North Carolina to a mulatto father and a white mother, William Goyens came to Texas in 1820, perhaps in the company of the pirate Jean Laffite, and settled in Nacogdoches. He would live the rest of his life in that city, though his business dealings spread far and wide. Officially declared a "free man of color," Goyens married Mary Pate Sibley, a white woman, in 1832. They had no children, though she had a son by a previous marriage.

Dec. 29, 2011 - The first farmers to plant rice in Texas did so in the same way that people planted nearly all crops in the early and mid 1800s: they plowed up a small plot of land, planted the seed by hand and prayed for rain. If it rained, they harvested the crop with scythes. If it didn't rain, they did without. This was called "providence farming" and the crop in this case was called "providence rice." As Texas rice farmers go into 2012, depending almost solely on how much rain falls between now and March 1 (see related story page 1A), it would seem that, at least for one year, Texas farmers will be farming the really old-fashioned way.