Toughest Men

Many Texans know Seguin as a town on I-10; the barbecue cognoscenti know it as home to the Burnt Bean Company, Texas Monthly’s latest pick as the best barbecue in the state. The tale of its namesake, however, is the best reason to admire Seguin. 

Juan Seguin was born and raised in San Antonio, the son of the postmaster. Juan followed in his father’s footsteps as a civil servant in the Mexican government, rising to be the de facto director of the Bexar district by 1834. Although Mexican through and through, he had common cause with settlers from America who opposed the centralization of the Mexican government. Thus, in 1835, Seguin led a force in support of a Mexican governor’s fight for federalism.

Seguin came to the attention of Stephen F. Austin, who granted him a Captain’s commission in the “Texian Army.” Seguin’s group participated in the first successful skirmish with the Mexican army at San Antonio. Following that, Seguin took up residence at the Alamo. Seguin avoided the fate of the other defenders only because Travis sent him out as a courier; his men, however, were part of the slaughter.  

When Seguin reached Gonzales and learned of the Alamo’s fall, he organized a Tejano fighting force that served as Sam Houston’s rearguard, following Houston and enabling Houston to reach San Jacinto. Seguin’s unit fought gallantly at San Jacinto, following which Seguin returned to San Antonio, where he accepted the Mexican’s surrender in that city.

Seguin’s service was recognized throughout the city. He was the area’s primary political leader for approximately six years, serving as the only Mexican in the senate and later as San Antonio’s mayor. We wish Seguin’s story ended there–as a war hero who chose to fight for freedom from his own government; someone who gave up a promising and comfortable future, risking his own life repeatedly, and who saw his friends slaughtered, revered by the country he helped create. 

Race complicates everything. Despite Seguin’s heroics, tensions between Anglo settlers and Tejano put Seguin under suspicion. When General Rafael Vasquez led a Mexican force into San Antonio in 1842 and briefly retook the town, Anglos believed Seguin to be treasonous, prompting him to flee to Mexico for his safety. Seguin fought for Mexico during the Mexican-American War but eventually returned to Texas and resumed his role as a political leader.

Seguin’s name is on this list, not only because he fought valiantly, but because his fight placed freedom over race.

The all-time pitching statistics–first in strikeouts, no-hitters, and opponents’ batting average; second in games started; fifth in innings pitched;  and 14th in wins. The real statistic that defines Nolan Ryan: 98 mph. That was the speed of his last pitch, thrown at age 46, right after he tore a ligament in his arm. 

Many remember the blood on Nolan’s uniform after the Robin Ventura fight, but the real sign of Nolan’s determination comes from the blood spilled after a Bo Jackson liner split Nolan’s face open. Stitches were for between innings. There would be no reason to leave the game. It is subjective, but if you ask who was the toughest baseball player ever, not many people will argue against Nolan Ryan.

Texas Ten was lucky enough to be in the park when Nolan set Ricky Henderson down for his 5,000th strikeout. We saw him pitch several times in person and many times on television. We know how important he was to both the Astros and the Rangers, for many reasons. Beyond the heroics, the willpower, and an indestructible right arm, he is on the list for a personal reason.

I was a young lawyer in 1992, returning to Dallas from Houston on a Southwest flight that was only half full. Who should board (in a late boarding group) but the Ryan Express? Nolan headed straight for the back of the plane and took the window seat in the last row. More comfortable seats were everywhere; it should have been evident that Nolan was looking for privacy. I remember he had a ranching magazine he wanted to read.

Close on his heels was a middle-aged male fanboy. Despite there being open rows of seating everywhere, Fanboy not only selects Nolan’s row, he takes the middle seat, for no other reason than to be next to Nolan. My first thought is that he must know Nolan. No, Fanboy introduces himself. Then, for the next 50 minutes, Fanboy whips Nolan with a steady conversation about a million things Nolan never wanted to hear. 

The price of fame? I saw it, and it is steep. Nolan could not have been more gracious. That was when I knew the true measure of Nolan Ryan’s mental toughness.

Most Texans know at least the general outline of Quanah Parker’s early life. His father was Pete Nocona, a feared war chief of the Comanche Nation’s Noconi branch. His mother was Cynthia Ann Parker, born to a settler family, but abducted by the Comanche and converted to their way of life. With his father killed and his mother recaptured, Quanah was effectively orphaned and then raised by the Quahada, another band of Comanche. 

Quanah’s physical gifts and leadership ability pushed him to war chief status in his tribe. By the late 1860s, the government had some success, using small carrots and big sticks, in convincing tribes to retreat to “Indian lands” in the Oklahoma territory. The Quahada were not buying. Their refusal to cooperate marked them as fugitives.

For seven years, the Quahada, under Quanah’s leadership, continued to rule the plains, their horsemanship and ferocity more than offsetting the growing firepower of the Army. Colonel Ranald Mackenzie conducted two failed campaigns in 1871 and 1872 to bring Parker and the Quahadas to heel. 

While Mackenzie could not confront, let alone capture, Parker and his group, Parker was fighting destiny. As buffalo hunters poured into the plains, Parker understood that the ongoing slaughter would wipe away their livelihood and way of life. It was not enough to avoid capture; they had to remove the hunters.

In June of 1874, Parker gathered an alliance of 700 warriors from several tribes and took his shot by attacking the 28 hunters housed at the Adobe Walls encampment. The attack was a disaster for the Indians, as they incurred significant casualties, while the hunters lost one man. That day, Parker knew their fate was sealed. Fighting removal was futile; it would only lead to more death and orphans. 

Thus came phase two of Parker’s leadership. After surrender, he joined the other Comanche in Oklahoma. The Indians were dispirited, and their former leaders adrift. Parker was soon the recognized leader of the entire nation. He negotiated effectively with his former adversary on behalf of his people, earned the respect and friendship of the Anglo power structure all the way to the White House. 

Parker never wanted to be an orphan, he never wanted to fight Mackenzie, and he never wanted to live unfree in Oklahoma. He fought majestically against those outcomes. Parker demonstrated his toughness, not by the fight but by the aftermath. A spirit that could recognize the good in some members of a nation that had served him injustice, and a desire for peace for his people that exceeded the rage that must have filled him.

In journalism’s checkered history of reporting on presidents and presidential elections, some headlines stand out. Dewey Defeats Truman was a whopper, for instance. For our money, no story was more wrong, more unfair than Newsweek’s October 19, 1987, cover story wondering if George H.W. Bush could overcome “the wimp factor.” You may notice that the link is to the Newsweek editor’s half-hearted apology for the story, in the context of the first Trump presidency. That apology is mostly retrospective and seems more motivated by a desire to ding the 45th and 47th president than to acknowledge how wrong he was about the 41st president. 

Texas Ten is here to set the record straight. When you hear about a young man enlisting in the armed service to fight a war, do you think–that guy is pretty soft? When Maverick bangs his fighter jet down on an aircraft carrier, is your reaction–that pilot is probably weak-kneed? When that fighter pilot survives a crash landing at sea after completing a bombing run in a damaged aircraft and sees two others die, do you wonder if the pilot was “tough enough?”

Or on another subject, how often is the captain of the university baseball team the weak link in your chain? That guy who walks away with one of the prettiest girls around; he must be just lucky to get her despite his apparent deficiencies? 

We can go on. Turning down patrician East Coast banking jobs to be a wildcatter in West Texas? Moving from that line of work to innovate ways to bring oil out of the ocean floor? Those sound like jobs for the weak at heart, right?

All of these were things that the first President Bush did before he entered public life. Once there, he took fire from his own congressional constituents for supporting the law that bans discrimination in housing, ran our spy agency, passed the Americans with Disabilities Act over intra-party opposition, and ran the only truly successful American military engagement after World War II.  

Wimp factor indeed. George H.W. Bush was the proverbial iron fist inside a velvet glove. He fought for what he knew to be right without reservation, with the courage to be kind to those who disagreed with him. Tough as nails.

Of all the Texans, indeed of all the soldiers who took the fateful trip across the English Channel, Eisenhower counted on one man more than any other. James Earl Rudder was a Lone Star man to his core. Born and raised in Eden, Texas, his football abilities took him to college. First, at Tarleton and then at “the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas,” now Texas A & M. Like all students at A & M in the 1930s, Rudder was male and a cadet in the corps. Upon graduation, Rudder received an Army commission, which he served in the reserves for eight years. Meanwhile, he became a highly sought-after football coach, first at Brady High near his hometown and then at Tarleton.

When all hell broke loose, Rudder’s reserve commission became an active duty commitment. By June of 1944, Rudder was a lieutenant colonel in command of the U.S. Army’s 2nd Ranger Battalion. The best football coaches know tactics well and how to motivate their men to physical superiority. Instilling teamwork and a sense of obliviousness to pain or anything that might distract the group from its objective is the most valuable tool in a coach’s toolkit. So, perhaps it is not surprising that Eisenhower, who had played and coached at West Point, turned to his best coach for the most daunting task of D-Day.

The main American landing zone consisted of two beaches: Omaha and Utah. A large promontory jutted into the Atlantic between the two beaches. Rising almost 100 feet straight into the air, Pointe Du Hoc occupied a perfect firing position from which the Germans could rain destruction on either beach. On top of Pointe Du Hoc sat six 155 mm French artillery cannons with a combination of range and firepower that could stop the invasion in its tracks. Earl Rudder’s job was to make sure those guns were silenced. Rudder knew for a while that his mission would include cliff scaling, and he trained his men harder than he had ever driven a football team. In May of 1944, less than a month before the invasion, Rudder and his 225 subordinates learned their exact assignment. Later, the survivors all professed certitude in their ability to accomplish the task.

The rest of the command was not as sure. The plan was for the 2nd Battalion to be the first to land, arriving on the beach at 6:30 am, scaling the 100-foot cliff using rope ladders, and taking out the Germans at the apex within 30 minutes. This maneuver would enable the first large wave, scheduled to land at 7:00 am, to have a chance of survival. One staff officer reportedly told Omar Bradley his view of the plan was that it was a suicidal mission; that “three old women with brooms” could keep the Rangers off the top of Pointe Du Hoc.

Of course, “Rudder’s Rangers” would not be without assistance on their scramble up the cliffs. In fact, for days before the assault, American air and sea power took dead aim at the German fortifications defending the guns. The biggest and most effective blasts came from the perfect source: The battleship U.S.S. Texas. Commissioned in 1914 and overhauled in 1925, the Texas was a lethal fighting machine. The main battery of ten guns launched 1,400 lb armor-piercing shells. On the morning of the attack, the sailors unleashed. In the span of 34 minutes, 255 of those 1400 lb shells found their marks on top of the cliffs. That is 178 tons of munitions in a remarkably short period.

The bombardment served its purpose by driving the Germans back from the cliff’s edge. The battleship and aircraft paused their bombardment so the Rangers could make their way up the cliff before the Germans returned.

They call it the “Fog of War” for a reason. To say that nothing is easy is an understatement; everything in war is hellaciously difficult. When the shelling stopped, Rudder’s Rangers were nowhere to be found.

Instead, the navigation in the Rangers Landing Ship malfunctioned. The captain tried to “dead reckon” his way to Pointe Du Hoc but did not correctly calculate for sea drift. To complicate matters, another promontory misled the men to think they were on the right course. Rudder was the first to recognize the mistake and ordered a change in course. Unfortunately, the detour meant a trip of 3-4 miles running parallel to the French Coast.

The detour was costly in three ways. The Rangers lost two landing craft as they made their way up the coast, and the Germans would have time to return to the fortifications after they realized the shelling had stopped. Worse than those two things, the element of surprise was gone. The Germans did not consider Normandy the most likely spot for the main Allied invasion, and they certainly thought a frontal assault on Pointe Du Hoc was out of the question.

By the time the remaining Rangers hit the beach at 7:10 a.m., all that was history. Although it probably never entered his mind, Rudder had a decision to make. Given the reduction in his troop strength, the lack of immediate cover from Texas or other sources, and the fact that the Germans now understood the plan, he could have relied on reinforcement Ranger Battalions. Those Rangers had landed on Utah Beach and were instructed that if Rudder’s Rangers did not achieve the goal, they were to fight their way inland and attack from the opposite side of the fortifications.

It would have been a defensible decision for a commander to make. However, Earl Rudder and his Rangers had not trained this hard and come this far to hope that someone else would accomplish their mission.

Pointe Du Hoc is not a steep hill. It is a sheer vertical face, approximately nine stories high. The men and their equipment were waterlogged. Water meant more than discomfort. The grappling ropes and ladders needed rocket launchers. The water degraded, and in some instances, eliminated the ability to put the ropes where needed. Every moment became an improvisation as the Rangers struggled up the ascent.

Men were falling, and Rudder was himself twice injured. At this point, it was a savage test of will. Rudder’s training, leadership, and presence pushed his Rangers to do the impossible, as approximately 100 Rangers out of the original 225 arrived at the top of the cliff. When they arrived, they found more than grandmothers with brooms, but now the Rangers had the momentum. They rooted the Germans out of their fortifications, taking some of the first prisoners of war for the day. Soon, they had enough land to establish a base of operations.

The Rangers were not sent just to grab land. The mission was to eradicate the big artillery cannons. Rudder soon realized something no one had expected. The guns were gone. In their place were painted poles that looked like guns to Allied aerial reconnaissance. That might seem a relief to normal people, but Rudder and his men understood what had happened.

The shelling from the Texas and others leading up to the invasion had put the Germans’ big guns at risk, so they moved them. The guns still had enough range to be deadly when fired from their new position, wherever that was. When every bone in their body must have cried to signal “Mission Accomplished,” Rudder’s Rangers pushed on and out to find their objective. Some secured the area while a two-man crew explored the nearby countryside.

For the first time that day, luck was on their side. The two-man crew stumbled on the unmanned guns. Using thermite grenades, the Rangers disabled the monsters they had been sent to vanquish. Against all odds, Pointe Du Hoc belonged to the Allies while the millions of men who would end the Third Reich streamed ashore underneath them.

Rudder returned to lead a celebrated life in his home state, most notably as President of his alma mater, Texas A & M.  As tough as the Germans had been, his A&M assignment might have been even rougher. Aggies love their traditions, and when Rudder arrived, it was still an all-male, all corps school. With characteristic determination and confidence, Rudder oversaw the changes that welcomed females and civilians as students. He ushered the school into the modern era, and it is now a prominent research institution that takes pride in its vast former student base. 

A great democracy and a great school owe much to Earl Rudder and his force of will.

Darrell Royal famously said that there are two sports in Texas, “football and spring football.” Of all the famous players the state has produced, no one epitomized the game like the Tyler Rose, the unstoppable force that was Earl Campbell on a football field. We could watch his highlights forever and not quite understand what we are seeing. The men that he runs over are strong, immense people. The men he runs past are like deer, usually. When Earl rampaged, none of that mattered. 

Our description of Earl’s exploits is much shorter than the others because so many of us were able to witness it. If not, it is there on YouTube to see, and words do not do justice to them. 

The highlight we want to emphasize, however, is the off-the-field Earl. Always soft-spoken and humorous, off-field Earl was a Dr. Jekyll to the Mr. Hyde of on-field Earl. That humility is rare in athletics and becoming rarer. What makes it exceptional is how Earl has maintained that attitude as his body gives out.

Canes, walkers, and golf carts became a necessary part of Earl Campbell’s life. Doctors and surgeries, more so. So few of us know what it is like to have immense physical prowess that hardly any of us understand what it must be like to have superhuman status replaced by the pain of a body that will not function normally. Earl Campbell knows the physical and emotional pain that comes from the way he played the game.

Yet, he still smiles, laughs, and jokes. Still, he signs autographs. He will flash a Hook’em sign whenever a star-struck Longhorn grandfather introduces his grandson to the “greatest running back ever” (apologies to Jim Brown). After all these years, Earl Campbell’s smile is as powerful as those famous thighs.

On June 30, 1942, Audie Murphy lied his way into the United States Army.  The lie was a falsified birth certificate proving he was 18. Within three years, Murphy was the most-decorated enlisted soldier in U.S. history, having been awarded every medal for valor there is, many on multiple occasions and including the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Sometimes “just the facts” are enough to make your point. To that end, the citation for Audie Murphy’s Medal of Honor citation reads as follows:

Second Lt. Murphy commanded Company B, which was attacked by six tanks and waves of infantry. Second Lt. Murphy ordered his men to withdraw to prepared positions in the woods, while he remained forward at his command post and continued to give fire directions to the artillery by telephone. Behind him, to his right, one of our tank destroyers received a direct hit and began to burn. Its crew withdrew to the woods. 

Second Lt. Murphy continued to direct artillery fire, which killed large numbers of the advancing enemy infantry. With the enemy tanks abreast of his position, 2d Lt. Murphy climbed on the burning tank destroyer, which was in danger of blowing up at any moment, and employed its .50-caliber machine gun against the enemy. He was alone and exposed to German fire from three sides, but his deadly fire killed dozens of Germans and caused their infantry attack to waver. 

The enemy tanks, losing infantry support, began to fall back. For an hour, the Germans tried every available weapon to eliminate 2d Lt. Murphy, but he continued to hold his position and wiped out a squad that was trying to creep up unnoticed on his right flank. Germans reached as close as 10 yards, only to be mowed down by his fire. He received a leg wound, but ignored it and continued the single-handed fight until his ammunition was exhausted. 

He then made his way to his company, refused medical attention, and organized the company in a counterattack, which forced the Germans to withdraw. His directing of artillery fire wiped out many of the enemy; he killed or wounded about 50. Second Lt. Murphy’s indomitable courage and his refusal to give an inch of ground saved his company from possible encirclement and destruction, and enabled it to hold the woods which had been the enemy’s objective.

How does a man do that? How do you overcome your fear? Audie Murphy fought so desperately because he had been doing it all his life. Murphy grew up in the Hunt County area. His father largely abandoned the family. Murphy developed his shooting prowess to put food on the table. He loved his mother deeply, but then lost her when he was only sixteen. 

He later remembered the loss this way: “She had the most beautiful hair I’ve ever seen. It reached almost to the floor. She rarely talked; and always seemed to be searching for something. What it was I don’t know. We didn’t discuss our feelings. But when she passed away, she took something of me with her. It seems I’ve been searching for it ever since.” 

Military service was not about movie heroism; it was about the heroism of putting food on the table for your siblings because nobody else would. Still, the movies came calling. Between his story and his looks, Murphy became one of the biggest stars of his era. Usually, the stuntman is the toughest guy on set. It is unlikely that anyone ever said that around an Audie Murphy movie. 

Murphy made some bad investments and ran into money troubles. Even then, he had a sense of duty as exhibited by turning down a small fortune to advertise cigarettes and liquor, afraid it would harm the kids. We lost him to a plane crash in 1971 at the young age of 46. We hope he found what he was looking for, as no Texan ever stood taller than the 5’5” Audie Murphy.

Charles Goodnight is the “Father of the Panhandle,” and noone has done a better job of describing the man than J. Evetts Haley in his classic biography Charles Goodnight – Cowman and Plainsman. We wish we could just read it to you. Buy it or check it out if you want to understand Texas.

A few highlights should give you some flavor of the man. He came to Milam County, Texas, from Illinois at the age of nine with his mom and stepfather, riding bareback on Blaze, his mare. Goodnight learned to hunt and track from a local Indian. He started his working life at eleven, hiring out to other farmers. At age 15, his horsemanship led to employment as a jockey for a while. Eventually, he and a step-brother graduated to running about 400 head of cattle near Waco, on the Brazos River. 

He assumed more responsibility over the herd and drifted north, into the Indian troubles. In 1860, Goodnight’s first brush with notoriety came. His tracking skills put him in alliance with the local regiment of the Texas Rangers. It was Goodnight who found the Comanche camp of Pete Nocona, Cynthia Ann Parker, and their child, Quanah. Goodnight guided Sul Ross’s crew to the location and participated in the Battle of Pease River, where Cynthia Ann Parker was recaptured.   

Goodnight spent the Civil War protecting the frontier in the Panhandle; he came to know it like the back of his hand. After the war, he resumed his cattle business. Prices in Texas were unsatisfactory. So he teamed with his friend Oliver Loving, hired a group of famous cowboys, and drove a herd to Fort Sumner, New Mexico. The drive was epic for a variety of reasons. It was the first known use of the chuckwagon. It opened what came to be known as the Goodnight-Loving Trail for later use by millions of heads of cattle. Most of all, they made it when nobody thought it was possible. 

If that sounds vaguely familiar, it should. The drive, Goodnight, and Loving, were the models for Larry McMurtry’s classic western Lonesome Dove. Gus was apparently supposed to be Loving, because, like Gus, Loving died from wounds suffered in an Indian attack. That makes Woodrow out to be Goodnight. 

Goodnight, however, was just getting started. After Mackenzie cleared the Panhandle of Indians, Goodnight bought property in Palo Duro Canyon, partnered with Englishman John Adair, and established the JA Ranch. The ranch, one of Texas’s greatest, still exists, although it is not the 1,300,000 acres it was at its height. Goodnight sold his share and moved on to a never-ending series of investments and adventures. 

His personal residence and ranch are in Armstrong County in the town that bears his name. It is now a state historic site that is worthy of your time.  The musical TEXAS, held every summer at Palo Duro Canyon, celebrates his life and that of his beloved wife Mary. We just scratched the surface.

Goodnight could ride for days without water, track any man or beast, wrangle immense cattle herds, and manage business at the highest level. He contracted with British aristocracy and old west outlaws, treating all fairly and being treated fairly in return. He enjoyed mountain-top highs and suffered painful defeats. He just kept going, living well into his nineties. What places him on this list, however, was his love for the land and the animals that it supported. His connection was mystical. The fortunes came and went, never bothering Charles Goodnight because he was doing what God put him on earth to do.

There is no need to repeat their story. Flawed? No doubt. Travis and Fannin were imperfect commanders, to put it kindly. Crockett was a publicity seeker. Bowie was a cad of the highest order. We do not know as much about the men under their command. But whatever they had done before their massacres, they died heroes.  

So let’s just say it this way. Without them, there is no us.

We did not know anything about Roy Benavides until I took the lead picture for this article shortly after Memorial Day, 2025, at the Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery. Curious, I looked him up. I will never forget him.

Benavides grew up poor in South Texas and was orphaned by the time he was seven. Raised by an aunt and uncle, he dropped out at age 15 to work the fields in support of the family.  He joined the National Guard to take advantage of the only opportunity available to a Hispanic dropout.  The National Guard led to active service; eventually, Benavides was an 82nd Airborne advisor in Vietnam.  

In 1965, he stepped on a landmine and did not wake up until he arrived at Clark Air Base in the Philippines. He returned to Fort Sam Houston for recovery. There, the doctors leveled with him–his paralysis would not go away. He would soon be a disabled veteran.

Benavides was terrified at the thought of leaving the Army. So, every night, he snuck out of bed and attempted lower body exercises that left him in tears. Encouraged by a wardful of soldiers, many of them amputees, Benavides continued a torturous progression, relearning to stand and then to shuffle while steadying himself on the wall. When the day came for the doctor to deliver Benavides his discharge papers, Roy swung his legs over the bed, rose, and walked over to greet the stunned medic. The doctor consented to a course of physical therapy that allowed Benavides to remain in the military. 

That was the warm-up act. Benavides was about to become a hero. The man who would never walk again gained selection to the Army Special Forces. During his training there, he befriended Sgt. Leroy White. Benavides and White were deployed together back to Vietnam.

Once there, Sgt. White delivered Benavides from a dangerous firefight.  On May 2, 1968, Benavides was leaving mass. He learned Sgt. White was part of a 12-man team pinned down by the North Vietnamese and under intense fire. Without hesitation, Benavides grabbed a knife, a first-aid kit, and hopped on a helicopter. The helicopter could not land, so Benavides jumped out and ran to his friend. 

Before he reached the group, he was shot in the leg and took shrapnel to the head from a grenade explosion. He made it to the group, organized them into a defensive posture, and began stabilizing the wounded. He escorted those who were still mobile to a helicopter and tried to get a second helicopter to the injured. In doing so, Benavides was shot in the stomach and hit with more shrapnel to the back from another grenade.

Having not made it out and still with the wounded, Benavides continued the fight and directed bombing strikes next to his position, all while holding his abdomen together with one hand. A brief window of opportunity appeared, and a helicopter landed.  As the only functional soldier left, Benavides made sure that all the classified materials on site got to the helicopter and then carried the wounded to the waiting bird.  

Before he could complete his runs, the North Vietnamese counterattacked. In brutal hand-to-hand combat, Benavides killed three more enemy, but not before he was clubbed in the jaw and bayoneted. They dragged him onto the helicopter. 

By the time they landed, Roy Benavides, who had fought so hard just to fight, was placed in a U.S. Army body bag. He had to spit at the doctor to let him know he was still alive. 

Eventually awarded the Medal of Honor, Roy Benavides never quit fighting for his fellow soldiers. He was instrumental in convincing Congress to fund continuing disability benefits for disabled Vietnam veterans.

Benavides’ story is not about who we are. It is the story of who we aspire to be; who we should be. There is a straight line from Juan Seguin to his friends who died at the Alamo to Roy Benavides. They were all heroes, not because of how they fought, but because of why they fought. Texas tough, all of them.