San Marcos: Texas State University

Texas State University San Marcos is where George Strait stopped being a ranch hand with a guitar and became a bandleader. After his honorable discharge from the Army in 1975, Strait enrolled at what was then Southwest Texas State University to study agriculture — a practical degree for a man whose family still ran cattle. But it was the music that changed everything. He answered a flyer posted around campus from a country band called Stoney Ridge looking for a lead vocalist. Strait auditioned, renamed the group the Ace in the Hole Band, and immediately became its heart and its face.

What followed was a Texas education of a different kind. The Ace in the Hole worked the honky-tonks and dancehalls of south and central Texas, traveling as far as Huntsville and Houston, opening for the Texas Playboys and Asleep at the Wheel, building a regional following note by note and night by night. Strait worked his family’s cattle ranch during the day and played music on nights and weekends. He graduated with his agriculture degree and stayed in San Marcos, because the band was working and the music felt right.

The university honored that connection for decades. In 1985, Strait established an endowment fund for the development of the Freeman Ranch for agricultural and wildlife purposes. In 2006, the university awarded him an honorary doctorate. Old Main — the limestone building that has anchored the campus since 1903 — still stands as it did when Strait walked these grounds. See also the Cheatham Street Warehouse, where the Ace in the Hole Band proved themselves night after night to the honky-tonk faithful of Central Texas.