Two boys in Garner
The story of Texas 42 begins in Garner, Texas, in 1887, with two young neighbors, William Thomas and Walter Earl. Their families and community discouraged playing cards on religious grounds, yet they still longed for the trick-taking games they saw elsewhere. Working with a double-six set of dominoes, they adapted the rhythm of whist to the tiles: partnerships, trump, following suit in spirit if not in pasteboard. What they invented was not a pale substitute but a new game with its own character, tight enough for a lifetime of study and warm enough for a kitchen table after supper.
They did not set out to write history. They set out to play a fair game under the rules their households could accept.
Word of mouth across Texas
There was no advertising campaign. Texas 42 traveled the way the state itself often did: by word of mouth, through church socials, family parlors, and courthouse squares. A cousin taught a cousin; a driller taught a roughneck; grandparents passed the count tiles and the bidding ladder to grandchildren between innings and after sermons. County by county, the game accumulated house rules and local pride, but the spine of the game, partnerships and trump and the arithmetic of forty-two points, remained recognizable everywhere you sat down to draw seven tiles.
Iconic Texans at the table
The game’s footprint is inseparable from small-town Texas life, but it also reached the halls of power. Lyndon B. Johnson was known to enjoy 42, including in the White House, where the draw of home-state ritual followed him east. For many Texans, that image captures something true: 42 is casual and democratic, yet dignified enough for anyone who respects a good partner and a clean mark on the score sheet. Whether the setting is a ranch house or a Washington sitting room, the table is still four chairs, two teams, and the quiet drama of whether the bid will hold.
Zavala blue and the Republic
Texas 42 shares air with the Republic of Texas imagination: independence, neighborliness, and symbols that outlive any single generation. The deep blue associated with Lorenzo de Zavala, statesman and signer, echoes in the colors Texans still reach for when they want to say “this is ours.” Follow Me 42 leans on that same Zavala flag blue not as a costume but as a nod: this game belongs to the same cultural family as the flag, the courthouse lawn, and the stories Texans tell about who they are.
Official State Domino Game
In 2011, the 82nd Texas Legislature put the weight of statute behind what parlors had already decided: Texas 42 was named the Official State Domino Game of Texas. The resolution was more than symbolism. It recognized generations of teachers and players who kept the game alive when flashier pastimes came and went. For newcomers, it is an invitation: if the state puts its name on the game, there must be something in it worth learning.
N42PA and Hallettsville
Organized play found a home in the National 42 Players Association (N42PA) and in the annual pilgrimage to Hallettsville for the Texas State Championship. There, strangers become partners, local experts meet statewide competition, and the subtle arts of bidding and trump selection are on full display. If your first 42 game was on a phone screen or a browser tab, the lineage of those tournament tables still runs straight back to Garner in 1887.
Why Follow Me 42
Follow Me 42 exists to carry this uniquely Texan tradition into the place today’s players actually gather: online. Distance, deployment, college, and diaspora no longer have to mean giving up the game you grew up on. We are building respectful, faithful tools so that bidding, partnership, and the old familiar count tiles can travel in your pocket or on your desk. This site uses a deep flag blue associated with Lorenzo de Zavala as a deliberate Texas nod; the star-and-42 mark is ours, meant to sit alongside the play you already know from kitchen tables, porches, and wherever your crowd draws tiles. The legislature gave the game a name in law; generations of Texans gave it a heartbeat. Our job is to help it follow you wherever you go.