LBJ Ranch

Driving west from Austin into the setting sun this past Friday night, I stopped for an hour to tour the LBJ Ranch. I figured I might as well given that I'll be attending the school bearing his name next to his presidential library for the next two years.

The ranch, located in Hill Country just outside Johnson City, is where LBJ was born in 1908 and is buried next to former first lady Lady Bird Johnson on the family plot. It's also the site of the Texas White House, where LBJ spent over 500 days during his presidency.

Upon leaving office, LBJ lived at the ranch until his death in 1973 and Lady Bird lived their until her death in 2007. Today, the ranch still raises cattle in addition to being a national historic site open to the public.

I arrived too late in the afternoon to get tickets for a tour of the residence, but I was still able to do the driving tour of the ranch. Following a country highway past the old entrance to the property--a dramatic causeway over the running, falling water of the Pedernales River--visitors pass the Trinity Church, site of the nation's first Head Start program (a program Johnson created) and then the first school LBJ attended, a simple one-room structure.

Continuing on the road, visitors can park in a small lot near the Johnson family cemetery. The cemetery is closed to the public but the graves of LBJ (on the right) and Lady Bird (on the left) are easily identifiable by their prominent headstones. Across from the cemetery is Johnson's reconstructed birthplace home.

The road then winds scenically through the ranch's open grasslands before concluding at the Texas White House. This residence sits at the end of a grass airstrip where Air Force One landed (a much smaller version than today's 747), next to a hangar that doubled as a press room.