TEXAS -- Take your boots off and stay a while! These facts about the Lone Star State are sure to keep you wanting more!
~On Oct. 2, 1835, Mexican troops tried to retrieve a cannon from the early settlers in Gonzales, Texas. The Texans went into into battle with a banner reading "Come and Take It." They won.
~The world's largest oatmeal cake was baked in Bertram, Texas, in 1991. The Labor Day weekend cake had 33 layers, was more than three feet tall and was eaten by 3,333 people.
~ There's a pillow at the Lyndon B. Johnson Ranch outside of Fredericksburg that reads, "This is my ranch and I do as I damn please."
~Built in 1965, the Houston Astrodome was the country's first domed stadium.
~Native Texan Tommy Lee Jones scored a football scholarship to Harvard University in the 1960s and became roommates with future Vice President Al Gore. Jones also participated in the Drama Club with Stockard Channing and John Lithgow. When Gore ran for president in 2000, Jones gave the nominating speech at the Democratic National Convention.
~Political Strategist Karl Rove attended nearly six colleges- without earning a degree- before teaching graduate students at the University of Texas.
~In 1990, Willie Nelson released the album "The IRS Tapes: Who'll Buy My Memories?" The purpose of this album was to use the profits to pay the IRS $16.7 million it claimed Nelson owed in back taxes.
~The setting of the movie "Office Space" was Illinois, but the Chotchkie's restaurant featured in the film was actually the Alligator Grille in Austin.
~The smallest state park in Texas measures 0.01 acre. Acton State Historical Park is the burial plot of Davy Crockett's second wife Elizabeth.
~Billions of crickets invaded Austin in 1915. City officials hauled them off in wagons.
~Caddo Lake on Big Cypress Bayou on the Texas-Louisiana state line is the only natural lake in the state.
~Cameron Walker of Irving was pulled over in 2007 for watching a pornographic video on a 10-inch TV while driving to a nightclub.
~In 2008, seven cheerleaders at Morton Ranch High School in Houston faced charges for blindfolding members of the junior varsity squad, tying their hands together with duct tape and pushing them into a swimming pool.
~Residents of Eldorado once held a "protest march protesting protest marches" in hopes of drawing attention from the International Olympic Committee.
~The 52-foot-tall cowboy Tex that welcomes visitors to the Texas State Fair every year wears size 70 boots and a 75-gallon hat.
~While playing at a live TV golfing event for charity, Charles Barkley stopped mid-swing to sign a contract with the Houston Rockets.
~It is illegal to urinate on the Alamo.
~Due to the Constitution of 1845 in which Texas approved its re-entry into the Union, the state still holds the right to divide into four states.
