Home on the Range

THE FIRST LADY

Still carrying a slight cough from a two-day bout with viral laryngitis, Mrs. Lyndon Johnson last week set out on her most ambitious beautifying and sightseeing trip since becoming First Lady. It was, appropriately enough, within the borders of Texas.

In San Antonio, where the Johnsons were married in 1934, she turned on a new scenic lighting system for the San Antonio River, then floated down the illuminated water on a barge while crowds lined the banks and local songsters serenaded her from bridges and landings. Lady Bird cited San Antonio as a model for the beautification and preservation efforts of other American cities. "Here is a great example of what can be done," she said. "It says to every city--look around and find the individual charm, the bounty of nature, the heritage of the past with which to rebuild."

From San Antonio, Lady Bird and her entourage, 70 strong, flew to the desert mountain fastnesses of Big Bend National Park, where she was greeted by a crowd of 4,200, including, one local noted, "every living critter around here." So stark and jagged that astronauts have visited it to see what they will encounter on the moon--yet fiercely beautiful withal--Big Bend receives far fewer visitors than most other national parks, was thus a prime spot for one of the First Lady's See America First promotion trips.

With a doctor beside her to treat possible rattlesnake, tarantula or scorpion bites, Secret Service men and rangers nearby to fend away any stray panthers or bobcats (Big Bend counts 28 species of snakes and 60 different species of animal), Mrs. Johnson hiked up the Lost Mine Trail for a look across the Rio Grande. She ate dinner beside a campfire at sunset, listened to Western songs from local troupes and genuine tall tales by a folklorist imported from the University of. Texas.

Big Bend had not seen such commotion since Pancho Villa tromped over the border in 1916, and it was hardly prepared for the crush. Extra telephone lines and fast-transmission Telex machines were jammed into ranger headquarters at Panther Junction to handle press copy, and a car stood ready to rush outgoing material to the airstrip 120 miles away. For Lady Bird's five-hour raft journey through the wild gorges of the Rio Grande, rangers had floated box lunches, soft drinks and coffee, and portable toilets to the sand bar where the party was to stop for lunch. The river, which frequently falls so low that rafts cannot negotiate it, was also up to the occasion--a full 1 ft. 9 in.

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