Top Gun

Texas Air chief Frank Lorenzo took an airline with no profits and limited prospects and built it into the country’s largest. How? By betting like the sky’s the limit.

by William P. Barrett

Hey, Mom, Have I got an Assignment for You

Once kids did their own homework. Now ambitious parents do it for them.

by Prudence Mackintosh

My Sister is Missing

Had she joined some cause? Was it suicide? Or had she wanted to disappear? After months of searching, I found the answer.

by Mollie Hawkins Sharpe

Petticoat Junction

All aboard for this spring’s flounciest fashions.

The Inside Story

A new breed of home-delivery specialists will bring everything from dinner for eight to a masseur to a dog trainer to your door. Here are more than a hundred to try.

by Joe Nick Patoski

It’s a Dirty Job, But?

Does the delivery business really deliver? Our author spends three grueling days watching rented videos and ordering pizzas to find out the truth.

C. W. Post

At first he couldn’t stand the strain of trying to get rich. Then he couldn’t stand the strain of being rich.

by Jan Reid

A Human Focus

Newly discovered photographs taken by Russell Lee bear compassionate witness to the lives of Spanish-speaking Texans in the forties.

Behind the Lines

by Gregory Curtis

Politics

The Bullock Alumni

Caught between the budget crisis and the power of Bob Bullock, politicos are hiring the comptroller’s savvy ex-employees in self-defense.

by Paul Burka

Books

Slim Pickens

Boone, T. Boone Pickens’ autobiography, is most interesting when it names names and tells tales, but such moments surface only occasionally and sink quickly.

by Paul Burka

Texana

Staying in Line

A group of dancers from Garland, aged 57 to 90, would rather rock on than rock in a chair.

by Joe Nick Patoski

Lifestyle

Home Ain’t Where My Heart Is

When I was growing up, Arlington didn’t have air conditioning or Six Flags. But it did have Albert’s Pool Hall and twenty-cent Jax beer, and that made all the difference.

by Gary Cartwright

Jazz

Pardon Me, Boy, Is That Tex Beneke?

At 73, this Fort Worth jazzman still sings “Chattanooga Choo-Choo,” but he wants new songs, more gigs, and younger audiences.

by Doug Ramsey

Movies

Epic Embroidery

The action in Platoon is brilliantly sustained, but The Mission falls with a stately thud; The Bedroom Window aspires to be as spellbound as an Alfred Hitchcock, but The Defense of the Realm is the engrossing thriller.

by James Wolcott

Reporter

Texas Monthly Reporter

Sneak a glance at our inaugural notebook to find out why Clements’ speech didn’t fly, which city had the most imperial ball, and who triumphed in the guv’s snub. Plus: Mad Maxian Car #3, space tombs in the sky, and ZZ Top’s song scuffle.

by Alison Cook

Roar of the Crowd

Bum Raps.

State Secrets

A busing controversy at the prison system; the high cost of free rent; the GOP goes to town; a well-known private eye loses his license; rotten eggs at Bentsen’s breakfasts.

by Patricia Kilday Hart

Touts

by Patricia Sharpe

Puzzle

Blots

The National Tour of Texas

The Rio Grande Valley never had a valley—except in the minds of developers who invented its name.

by Dick J. Reavis

The Quidnunc

Waiting for Perot; sizing up Texas’ legal egos; switching undies with Bobby and Laura Sakowitz.

by Mark Seal