As my husband and I were driving through downtown I snapped this picture of one of my favorite mythological symbols; the Pegasus.  He is a winged divine stallion and has been a Dallas icon since it was installed on the roof of the Magnolia Building in 1934.  The 29 story building was the city’s first skyscraper as well as the tallest building in Texas and west of the Mississippi.  It was even taller than any building in Europe.  Immediately it became a Dallas landmark, soaring majestically 450 feet and could be seen in those days 75 miles away on a clear night.  Pilots claimed catching sight of it as far away as Waco.  The Pegasus is actually two identical horses spaced fourteen feet apart and each horse measures 40 feet in length.  A quarter of a mile of red neon tubing lights the details on both sides and the flying red horses were installed to revolve on top of a 50 foot metal tower made to resemble an oil derrick.  When referring to having two horses back to back, Harold Wineburgh, the owner of the Texlite sign company who created the icon quipped, “Dallas doesn’t want to be known as a one horse town.”  A three horsepower motor turned the fifteen ton structure one revolution every 40 seconds.  In 1973 the City of Dallas gave the Pegasus the status of “Landmark Sign” and in 1976 it became the property of the City of Dallas.  It is now part of the City of Dallas Public Art collection.  In 1999 it became impossible to restore the old sign.  Over the years it had become rusted and would not survive being remounted.  So a new sign was built at a cost of $600,000 and the symbolic icon was installed just in time to usher in the new millennium.  A special thanks to June Mattingly, the daughter of the creator of our city’s icon, who provided the facts and stats I have included here.  Assyria had her famous winged bulls, Venice has the winged lion, but Dallas has her beloved winged stallion — the Pegasus.