Professor Benjamin Johnson

He converts to Catholicism.

At one point, he even helps put down an uprising in East Texas against Mexican rule.

But I think everyone has a sense that this is a

kind of volatile cocktail and unsteady mix, right, that people are still figuring out how this whole thing is going to work.

Sure.

That is the date that the Rangers give for their founding date.

And, you know, it does have a basis.

There's a description that Austin hires 10 experienced frontiersmen as what he calls rangers and a punitive expedition against Tonkoa Indians.

But there's not, you know, there's not a bureaucracy.

There's not a uniform.

There's not a command and control structure until really the middle of the Texas Revolution, towards the end of 1835, when Texas lawmakers, you know, the Congress of this would-be independent nation, which is still fighting Mexico for its independence, create a force, authorize the creation of a formal force called the Texas Rangers.

So 1823, 1835, take your pick.

Yeah, the Texas Republic exists between 1836, when Texas very improbably wins its revolution and actually captures the head of state of Mexico, Santa Ana, a vastly larger polity that it had no chance of actually conquering.

And the Republic lasts until 1845, when it becomes a part of the United States as a state.

They are making war on hostile powers and attempting to prevent outside powers from making war on Anglo-Texas.

That's right.

Yeah.

And especially in the early years, they end up doing a lot of things.

Right.

Because.