As children, we often went down from California to visit my Dad's mother and father in Beaumont, Texas (mid-forties to mid-fifties). My cousins and I would often visit a closet under a staircase off the dining room where my grandfather kept his father's civil war uniform, bugle and a big Colt .44 Army model percussion revolver that weighed about 2 1/2 pounds. It makes you wonder if those fast-draw guys had one arm larger than the other. His father was the first white settler at Sabine Pass, circa 1825.

One cousin was a signer of the Texas declaration of independence from Mexico. Another two fought at San Jacinto under Houston. My Dad's grandmother, who lived until around 1924, remembered her father hosting Sam Houston in their home at Sabine Pass while a young girl. None of them appear to have been particularly musical, save one great-aunt, who was a piano teacher. My Dad tried, but sounded a lot like Harry Truman, who had trouble with minor chords too.