This past weekend marked the first combined class reunion for graduates of Llano High School between 1960 and 1969. A goodly number of former students and their spouses attended a pleasant night down memory lane in the patio area of the Badu House. Background music featured appropriate tunes from the era, while guest mingled casually and munched from a well supplied buffet table constantly replenished with hearty and tasty snacks and appetizers.

Levi V. Arnold was born in Franklin County Tennessee in December, 1819. He went to Arkansas with his parents, Elijah and Elizabeth Shults Arnold in the early 1830’s, but by 1840, he joined his married sister, Mary, now Mrs. David Hill, in Harrison County Texas, where the couple had lived since before the Texas Revolution.

It’s difficult to picture much good coming from any war where many lives are lost on the battlefields. It’s easy to point out bad things brought about by war. As far as Llano County’s connection to the Civil War, both the good and the bad were determined more by our county’s location on the Texas frontier rather than anything that occurred where the fighting actually took place.

March is typically set aside in the State of Texas to honor the events surrounding the 1836 Texas Revolution to gain independence from Mexico. The fighting ended on April 21 at the Battle of San Jacinto, and General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna was taken prisoner. Shortly thereafter, the Treaty of Velasco officially ended the conflict……..sort of.

Recent research on early major events that impacted Llano County, especially during the Indian Era, as well as the study just completed on early Llano County widows, led to an amazing discovery I had never known before. An informal document written in later years by a man who grew up in Llano County and just across the county line in Burnet County provided interesting details not recounted elsewhere.

Widows have long played an important role in the history of Llano County. When some of the county’s earliest settlers arrived, they brought with them their aging widowed mothers. Although the Germans settled along the Llano River in western Llano County by 1847, they did not have many older men or women among their number.

Many early Llano County marriages took place for reasons other than romantic love. Naturally, there was genuine fondness between couples, which over the years developed into true love, but at the beginning of many marriages, other factors were involved. If a woman had not found a husband by the time she reached her twenties, society soon thought of her as a “spinster.” Spouse availability wasn’t the greatest anyway, and the older a girl got, the less eligible she became.

With Valentine’s Day coming up this week, all media advertising is trying to gain their fair share of the millions of dollars consumers spend each year on this one day big event. Besides Mother’s Day and the major holidays, more phone calls, gifts, flowers, candy, and greeting cards will be exchanged than any other time of the year.

In conjunction with the current revamping at the Llano County Historical Museum, whereby present exhibits are being updated and rearranged to tell the history of Llano County in a more organized chronological order, the era personally referred to as The Tumultuous Years for the sake of clarity and convenience is under revision.

The Llano County Historical Society is currently involved in an on-going project to create a clearer understanding of the major events that made our county what it is today. The story that unfolds has been chronologically arranged as much as possible, although some topics by necessity have overlapped, such as farming and ranching, churches, schools, etc.

A current project of the Llano County Historical Society is updating the exhibits in the Llano County Historical Museum so they are more user-friendly to visitors. Museum specialists from the State Historical Commission have provided suggestions and guidelines to improve ways to display historical items. Visits to other recently renovated museums have resulted in better usage of signage to tell the story of Llano County.

Since predictions about the Mayan calendar did not materialize, the year 2013 can make its debut without the onset of gloom and doom. That doesn’t mean the knowledge behind the calendar was false, but rather our current theories on such subjects were based on assumptions that were incorrect. The Mayan calendar shows the world revolves around certain laws of the universe that are constant, even if the laws do not visibly present themselves for hundreds, even thousands of years.

With the days leading up to Christmas 2012, everyone is getting increasingly anxious about the year’s most popular holiday. Many are already behind in getting ready for the experience, whether in planning, shopping, or trying to figure out how to manage financially. With the economic situation and political scene less than stable, much of what everyone remembers as a really good time in past years could be in jeopardy this year.

The first Saturday in December has been reserved in recent years for the Llano Woman’s Culture Club Home Tour to raise money for scholarship recipients. The tour features the interior of newly constructed homes along with the renovation of some of the county’s oldest homes. Some tours highlighted homes outside the town of Llano, such as in the Valley Spring Community, and last year, around Castell.

Readers were recently challenged to explore the scenic wonders and places of historical significance throughout Llano County. This article will concentrate on specific landmarks in Llano County, namely mountains, which serve as scenic locales and historic sites. Allotted space has narrowed the focus even further to include only those landmarks located near the town of Llano and south of the Llano River.