San Antonio Express newspaper, Sept. 8, 1936,. Tuesday.
The management board of the Daughters of the Republic of Texas will hold two meetings here Thursday, Mrs. Lieta Small, custodian of the Alamo, announced Monday. It is hoped Mrs. Clara Briscoll Sevier of Corpus Christi, State president will attend but if she does not Mrs. Carrie Franklin Kemp of Houston, vice president, will preside.
The meeting is a regular session but it is expected considerable time will be devoted to a study of the Alamo requirements, now that $75,000 in federal centennial funds have been formally allocated. The board will make a thorough survey of the Alamo and the grounds, Mrs. Small said.
Neither Mrs. Small nor Mrs. Henry Wofford, president of Alamo chapter, Daughters of the Republic, were able to say in detail how the $75,000 will be spent. It was asked for repairs to the Alamo and beautifications of the grounds. The only repair definitely needed now is to the roof.
The present roof was applied in 1920 with a five-year guarantee. It now leaks so badly to endanger not only relics and records but the walls themselves. Mrs.Small said. She feels certain the expenditure of the entire $75,000 is not contingent on obtaining the necessary land to create a state park of the entire block inclosing the Alamo.
Mrs. Small said she did not believe the management board plans to confer with the centennial advisory committee.
The $20,000 allocated to San Jose Mission will be used to complete the tower and dome, started some years ago but left unfished for lack of money, for the restoriation of the altar and for some work on the cloisters in the monastary section, Rev. James Lockwood secretary of Most Rev. A. J. Drossaerts, Archibishop of San Antonio, said.
No cost estimates are available now. The tower and dome will be completed
first and what is left applied to other purposes. Father Lockwood quoted
the archbishop as saying the $20,000 would be insufficient for all the
work needed.
