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Don't you dare insult Texas in front of Dan Blocker
This cowboy wasn't messing around.
As a native Texan, Dan Blocker never forgot his roots. The Bonanza actor may have traveled to Hollywood to make a name for himself as a television star, but he stayed fiercely defensive of his home state. The actor became especially fired up when people dismissed the state based on a few bad apples.
"I get angry when I hear people belittle Texas," said Blocker during an interview with the UPI Hollywood Correspondent. "They're talking about the loudmouth braggarts with airplanes and oil wells. Those guys are professional Texans and amateur human beings. I'm damned sick and tired of the stereotyped Texan being represented as typical. There are roughly four and a half million Texans and only one percent of them fit the stereotype."
By no means did Blocker have such an easy life as those braggarts he previously mentioned.
"We were poorer than poor," said Blocker. "When my father's farm failed - and he cleared that eighty acres over a period of six years with his bare hands and an axe - he became a blacksmith in deep East Texas. Later, he moved us to O'Donnell, Texas. He had lived alone there in a dugout for a while because of the dust and winds. And my sister died of pneumonia. It was a time and place where only the strong survived."
Still, thanks to some hard work, Blocker's family was not only able to survive, but thrive. Blocker may have left Texas, but he kept the pride he felt his state had earned.
"Thanks to his [Blocker's father's] thrift and toughness and the help of Franklin Roosevelt, we were saved," said Blocker.
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