Y2 … What?
The world seemingly teetered on turmoil 25 years ago this month at the hands of Y2K, a supposed computer glitch that threatened to stymie systems as the calendar turned from 1999 to 2000. It was quite a big deal—though for TCP’s editors and writers, not so much:
Samantha Bryant: I was at my grandmother’s house in Poolville, listening to the news on TV while my siblings and I did a Y2K-proof activity—a puzzle.
Chris Burrows: I was making sure our family computer kept ticking (by playing video games all night).
Alex Dal Santo: We were with neighbors, watching Space Jam. None of the adults seemed very concerned.
Claire Stevens: That was before my time, but my parents didn’t even see midnight. I’m told they “went to bed hoping the world and digital appliances would live to see the next day.”
Tom Widlowski: I was one of the 260,000 revelers packing Congress Avenue in Austin.
Read Black-Eyed Peace to learn more about the experiences of Texans during Y2K.
75 Candles
Three Texans with storied careers in their chosen fields turn 75 this month.
• Hall of Fame golfer Tom Kite was born December 9, 1949, in McKinney.
• ZZ Top guitarist Billy Gibbons was born December 16 in Houston.
• Academy Award-winning actress Sissy Spacek was born December 25 in Quitman.
Targeting Bison
A group left Fort Griffin for the first commercial buffalo hunt in Texas 150 years ago this month—December 26, 1874. Before the decade was out, bison, which once numbered 30 million–60 million in North America, were nearly extinct due to overhunting. Today there are more than 400,000 in the U.S.
