Editor's note: The story of the bet is wholly untrue. According to Bill George and the Brown Brothers there never was a bet of any kind. Who knows where that rumor started, but there is no factual basis for it. According to Bill George, he and Frank Brown were sitting around at an archery competition outside San Marcos, an event catered by Bill, when Frank asked if anybody had ever taken a boat from Aquarena Springs to the Gulf of Mexico. Neither Bill, nor anybody else there, could ever remember anybody doing such a trip. Bill asked Frank, "So, when do you want to go?" And, THAT is how the event got started.

Frank Brown worked for the City of San Marcos as Manager of the Chamber of Commerce. Part of his duty was to generate attention for the city and to attract visitors, new businesses and new residents to grow the community. "His past experience taught our dad what he needed to do to put the tiny town of San Marcos, Texas on the map - the WORLD map!", according to Jeff Brown. Frank was a promoter with excellent media relations and Bill was a man who grew up on the Guadalupe River, and who was an expert hunter and fisherman with vast experience as an outdoorsman.

Frank Brown believed that the San Marcos River could be turned into a major attraction for the city and draw visitors from far and wide. However, in those days the river was, well, just the river, and no commercial use was being applied to it. Occasionally, boaters - mostly fishermen - would paddle the river for short distances. Brown and George decided to make a "safari" out of the river by paddling a large row boat from Aquarena Springs all the way to Corpus Christi on the Gulf of Mexico. Their inaugural trip required about 20 days - just slightly longer than 1997's winning time of 29 hours 46 minutes. And, it was three weeks of hard paddling. In fact, Life Magazine photos show scenes that look like something straight out of "African Queen" starring Humphrey Bogart. Pith helmets and shirtless amid the mosquitoes and the hot Texas sun.

(Editor's note):Anyone who has paddled the San Marcos knows how tough it can be to portage places like Cummings Dam, or shoot the gaps at Cottonseed Rapid in a small, lightweight boat made of Crosslink III polyethylene or Royalex. These guys did it in an 12-foot, semi-V hull Lone Star wide-beam row boat! My guess is that they were glad to get past the San Marcos and hit the flat water of the lower Guadalupe, some 80 miles down river from the starting point.

On that maiden voyage Brown and George had no support from anyone and depended entirely upon what they could find or catch to eat, as well as the provisions they took with them. According to Bill George, they caught and ate a lot of fish, two egrets, doves, wood ducks, spanish ducks, squirrels, rabbits and Bill killed two small deer with his .410 shotgun, giving them something different to eat for a few days. (According to Bill George, they did accept an occasional candy bar from people under bridges where they passed, but they accepted no other support from the shores.) Their provisions included a skillet, coffee pot, salt, pepper, coffee and corn meal. That tradition of self support is part of the Texas Water Safari today, where team captains may resupply teams with water and ice, but nothing else. All food, clothing, medical supplies, lights, batteries, drink mixes (high energy powders, etc) and everything else one needs to complete the Safari must start the race in the boat with the paddlers, and anything provided by anyone other than the aforementioned ice and water supplied by team captains results in immediate disqualification as soon as the infraction is reported. Like golf, this is a race of honor where participants are trusted to obey the rules.

(Editor's note):Beginning in 2013, the rules were changed as to what provisions may be provided to a team by their team captain during the race. The current rule states, "Team captains may deliver items of food, ice, drink or medical materials at any time during the race which they, in their sole discretion, deem necessary for the health or safety of the team."

Along the way they slept in a pup tent with a floor and zippered door to keep the snakes, mosquitos and varmints out. At one point during their trek it rained for 3 straight days causing the the river to rise over one foot. The result was an easier time paddling as they rode the current downriver. Bill says that Frank would spend time putting band-aids on every bite, blister and sore, leaving the ground around him looking like a three foot radius circle of snow. Apparently, Frank carried more band-aids than food.

So, who was Frank Brown? He was born in Mart, Texas on March 31, 1928 to Frank Leslie Brown and Joni Weathers Brown. After high school, Frank attended Baylor University in Waco, where he came within 6 credit hours of earning his Bachelors Degree in Journalism, leaving school to support his family. He served his country in both the Navy and the Air Force where he served on Guam as a Staff Lieutenant. Frank flew small aircraft, including the plane he owned, and when he wasn't flying he enjoyed time away on his Indian Chief motorcycle.

While attending Baylor Frank was a salesman at Gordon Rountree Motors. After college, he used his knack for marketing by serving as Manager of the Chambers of Commerce of Winsboro, Texas and Atlanta, Texas before landing in San Marcos where he served for about three years before leaving his position in a disagreement with the city fathers over a $1,000 phone bill incurred during the first Texas Water Safari even though his efforts resulted in the Life Magazine coverage that probably did more to promote that city than had been previously done by those who went before him.

After working for the Amarillo (Texas) Globe Times as a reporter where he covered the assassination of President John F. Kennedy on television Frank moved back to Central Texas in 1964, and worked as a guard at the State School for Boys at Gatesville, Texas, then managed by the Texas Youth Council, while working on college courses in psychology and socialogy. Within a year he completed his course work and became a case worker at the State School.

He married Mary Alice Ivie and they had three sons, Jeff, Jim and Tom and a daughter named Missy. Jeff and his family live in Bedford, Texas. Jim and Deborah and their sons live in Plano, Texas, and Tom and Cathy live in Bruceville, Texas with their children. Missy married, and is now Missy Brown Engler, living in Greenwood, Indiana with her husband and children.

Frank retired in 1974, and built a home in Hewitt, Texas, just outside Waco. Mary Brown died of an aneurysm on June 30, 1976, and Frank Brown passed away just days after his 50th birthday, in Waco, Texas on May 17, 1978, from a massive heart attack. He has never received the credit and honor that is his due for his efforts at starting the Texas Water Safari. Hopefully, this web site will remedy that injustice and make his name a legend along side the race that he started for the purpose of promoting the Town of San Marcos. Sadly, the town seems to have forgotten both the man and the race, and is not actively engaged in promoting or supporting this great event.

An interesting note regarding that first run in 1962, was that both Frank and Bill lost 40 pounds due to lack of food and enormous stress. Along the way Bill told Frank that he was going to find and kill a raccoon for them to eat. While in the woods Bill encountered two small deer, and waited until their necks crossed as they approached each other. Using number 6 buckshot, Bill dropped both deer with a single shot. Upon returning to the camp Frank remarked that those were the strangest looking raccoons he had ever seen. Hungry and faced with the prospects of starving Bill had a choice to make - shoot a deer out of season or go hungry. Unfortunately for the deer, Frank and Bill were hungry, and the deer gave its life that they might survive to win their places in history, going on to start the now famous marathon canoe race that is known as the Texas Water Safari - The World's Toughest Boat Race.

When you attend the race, and see all those boats and paddlers in their graphite racing canoes, Alumicraft or Grumman aluminum canoes, or canoes and kayaks made of wood, cloth, Royalex, Crosslink III or other plastics stop for just a minute and think of the man who made it all possible by paddling with his good friend for nearly 375 miles in a large aluminum row boat when there were no crowds to cheer them on, no trophies and patches awaiting at the finish line, and only the glory of a job well done and the Life Magazine article that will forever enshrine the names of Frank Brown and Bill George as the true fathers of marathon canoe racing in Texas, and which will always serve to remind us of the vision and courage of Frank as he created and promoted the Texas Water Safari. Most of us who paddle have heroes, and Frank Brown is mine!