I guess it wouldn’t be right to say that Jerry Bridwell is in his second childhood – that might give folks the wrong idea – but it’s safe to say that, after a very successful career in the oil and gas industry, the Horseshoe Bay resident has returned to a childhood dream. Ever since he discovered an arrowhead at a friend’s ranch fifty-odd years ago, Bridwell has had a passion for all things related to the American Indians who once populated Texas. Now retired, he’s pursuing that passion in several different ways from his unique retirement home overlooking Horseshoe Bay and Lake LBJ.

Jerry spent his early years in the Texas panhandle and eastern New Mexico. He was just ten years old when a friend took him out hunting arrowheads. He suspects that the first one he found may have been “planted” by his friend, but the discovery was enough to get him hooked. Through his teenage years, he took every opportunity to hunt arrowheads and go on archaeological digs. He dug in Pueblo ruins in New Mexico, and was always on the lookout for a promising site to add to his artifact collection. When he went to college, he majored in anthropology and took as many archaeology classes as he could, often conducting extra research on his own. Somewhere along the way, economic considerations kicked in (possibly because he met his future wife, Glenna. They married in 1964; they have a daughter, a son and two grandsons), and he decided on a career in geology.

That career took the Bridwells to Houston, Amarillo, Tulsa and finally back to Houston. As Jerry worked his way up to Senior Vice President of Exploration for Santa Fe Energy Resources, his interest in Native American life was put on the back burner. In 1999, he retired at age 57 “so I could golf and hunt arrowheads.”

On a trip to Waco, Bridwell’s early dreams got a shot in the arm when he met flint-knapper Woody Blackwell now living in Washington D C (“In my opinion, the best there is,” Bridwel ...

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