August 1986

Table of Contents

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Features

The National Car of Texas

It’s big, it’s fast, it’s powerful, it eats gas, it’s the Suburban.

Mack Wallace, Railroad Commissioner, Wants to Save the World

Tapped by destiny, one man in Austin is forging an unlikely alliance between Texas oilmen and the friends of Israel.

The Madman on the Tower

In a ninety-minute reign of terror, gunshots rang out that still echo in the history of Texas.

A Midsummer Night’s Gleam

Of fireflies and summer romance.

Dark Victories

Dusky colors and smart shapes are the winners for fall fashion.

Texas Primer: Big Red

Its passionately loyal following may make this drink the last Texan soda pop on the planet.

Why I Didn’t Attend Farm Aid II

Thank God I’m sort of a grown-up.

Free Enterprise U.

Let’s hear it for Dallas’ Northwood Institute, where entrepreneurialism is second only to high society fundraising.

Western Art: The Yellow Rose of Texas

Columns

Behind the Lines

Travel

Waco’s Secrets Revealed

Cradled on the Brazos, this central Texas town yields its pleasures ever so grudgingly.

Movies

Dagwood As D.A.

Legal Eagles is guilty of being humdrum and hokey; Mona Lisa has some fine, gracing touches; Vagabond finds purity within the dirtiest packaging.

Popular Music

Deep Ellum’s Summer of Love

Dallas’ new late-night club scene is daring and diverse, a showcase for pioneering bands.

Art

The Blood-red Maya

At the heart of this ancient culture were cruelty, self-mutilation, and ghostly visions.

Books

Texas, In Short

The characters in Prize Stories and South by Southwest often dwell on the past while living out their lives in an anxious present.

Reporter

Reporter

Texas Monthly Reporter

Life after TECAT in North Forest; Joe Rinelli gives his beauties a shot at the crow; Kerrville residents have a winter’s worth of tall tales.

Miscellaneous

Shopping

Elliott’s is the Louvre of hardware stores—it’s got flyshooters, fan blades, and three aisles of screws. In other words, it’s heaven.

Downtown

Dallas cracks the whip on weeds and litter.

Post-Modern Times

UT is testing this device that works like a BB gun, only it’s a little more powerful—it’ll be able to shatter a Soviet warhead speeding through space.

The Quidnunc

Desperately seeking the Cadillac Couch; reading Carolyn Farb’s mail; cowboy cologne strikes again.

Touts

Dabbling in the spot market.

Roar of the Crowd

Puzzle

State Secrets

A cap for San Antonio that wouldn’t look good on Henry Cisneros; long-term pessimism hits the oil market; Texas cities finagle their way around the tax reform.

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