This charming new mural is made of paint on 4 panels, in the style of the 1930s-style vacation postcard touting the city of Hutto, it's heritage, industries, and landmarks. Of course it is dominated by what makes Hutto unique, which is (as everyone in Texas knows) the home of the Hippos.
(That would be the Hutto Independent School District Hippos, and their female counterparts, the Lady Hippos. The Hutto High School Football Hippos had a respectable season, however they washed out in the first tournament bracket of the UIL 5A District 2 semifinals, falling to the Magnolia TX Bulldogs by a score of 58-23.)
So why Hippos? According to local legend, in the 1890s a circus train on its way to another city stopped briefly in Hutto take on water. A circus hippo broke out of a wooden railroad car, and rumbled over the prairie into nearby Cottonwood Creek.
We now rejoin our regular art category waymark: Hutto has always had hippo mural somewhere in downtown. I remember a different mural from my childhood and another different mural from a visit in the mid-1990s. Earlir murals can be seen on Google.
This mural was placed in 2013, and serves as a gateway into Hutto's historic and revitalizing downtown, which is transitioning from formally vacant turn-of-the-century stores that served a small agricultural community into a vibrant strip of unique specialty stores, and antique shops (what we call "cute country ducks and bunnies" places) catering to the growing suburban population that now calls Hutto home.
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"A new mural featuring Hutto’s mascot, the hippo, is set to be installed in downtown Hutto by the end of this year. The purpose of the mural is to draw visitors to the city. The mural will be painted by Suzanna Huser, a local artist. It will be displayed at 101 East Street and will also feature the city’s flower, the orange crush lily. “This mural will be the first public art piece to have done there, and we hope to attract visitors from Hwy. 79 to visit downtown and explore Hutto,” Hutto Downtown Manager Kim McAuliffe said. The mural is set to be finished on October 19th, just in time for Hutto Old Tyme Days. Work will begin this month."
The mural consists of 3 panels put together to form the larger image. The bottom third of the mural is dominated by the roaring traditional Hutto hippo with his mouth wide open showing his sharp teeth. He stands on the rolling Texas Prairie of this area, Cottonwood Creek running through it with a clump of pretty flowers in the corner. Maybe the hippo is getting ready to eat the flowers, we don't know.
The word 'Hutto' arcs across the top two thirds of the mural, with each letter being rendered in outline so that a local Hutto historic scene can fill the empty space. These scenes are from Hutto's agricultural past, which is really not that far in the rearview mirror. When Mama and Daddy Blaster were here 1995, Hutto was still at country town, although with new subdivisions spreading out from the seeds of the 1980s, we could see the handwriting on the wall.
The letters that form the name Hutto are filled with scenes as follows:
H -- A pioneer farmer breaking sod, watched by local Kiowa Indians
U -- Historic downtown Hutto
T -- The Hutto Evangelical Lutheran Church
T -- Old Hutto water tank and new Hutto water sphere
O -- The Old Cotton Gin and Grain buildings
In the corners of the image are the words, "greetings from [Hutto] Texas, Est.1876.
Its a cute landmark for town that's rapidly changing and clearly wishes to preserve its small-town charm, Swedish ethnic history, and agricultural heritage in an time of rapid urbanization as the booming cities of Austin and Round Rock spread out.
TRUE: Mama Blaster has loved Hutto since her Dad brought her here in the early 1970s. Dad told me that Hutto is home of the Hippos -- and they were everywhere. He was right, of course -- but most of the hippos in Hutto are either made of concrete or painted on walls. As a little kid, Mama Blaster was expecting real hippos of the zoo variety.
Any disappointment that I might've felt however was dissipated immediately when I got to have my picture made on an enormous purple hippo that stood in a little pocket park downtown.
As a young married couple, Daddy Blaster and Mama Blaster (back before we were Blasterz at all) visited Hutto, and had our pictures made with the same hippo, who by then was missing an ear.
20 years after that, our daughters Younger and Older Sister Blaster had their pictures taken on that hippo, who is still missing his ear.