Alamo Is First Texan World Heritage Site

But UN isn't in control of site, officials stress
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Suggested by AEK
Posted Jul 6, 2015 2:21 AM CDT
Alamo Is First Texan World Heritage Site
A date and initials are seen etched into an interior wall of the Alamo.   (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

"Remember the Alamo" is now a United Nations directive as well as a rallying cry. The San Antonio site and four other Spanish Colonial missions in the area have been designated UNESCO World Heritage sites for their "outstanding cultural or natural importance to the common heritage of humanity," the Guardian reports. The designation, which comes after a long campaign by officials in San Antonio, makes the missions the first World Heritage sites in Texas, USA Today reports. Other US World Heritage sites include the Grand Canyon and the Statue of Liberty, and the 1,000 or so others worldwide include the likes of Stonehenge and the Taj Mahal.

"Not only does the World Heritage site designation raise San Antonio's international profile, it stands to add over a thousand jobs and more than $100 million to our city's economy," US Rep. Joaquin Castro tells the Dallas Morning News. The Alamo was the site of a last stand by doomed defenders against Mexican troops during the Texas Revolution in 1836, and the Guardian notes that some Texans are suspicious about anything involving the UN. Officials in San Antonio stress that the UN doesn't have jurisdiction over the site and the "management, how everything is managed, will stay the same." (Last year, an El Paso man who peed on the Alamo was sentenced to 18 months.)

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