Grape and Pillage
By chain-sawing three acres of its research vineyard near Fort Stockton, the University of Texas System uncorked quite a controversy.
By chain-sawing three acres of its research vineyard near Fort Stockton, the University of Texas System uncorked quite a controversy.
Hot CDsFew voices evoke the pathos of country and western tragedy as genuinely as the rich, honeyed timbre of George Jones. By 1962, the year Jones signed with the United Artists label, the East Texan had been divorced, jailed, and was already as legendary for his hard drinking as his
George W. Bush faces a dilemma. What’s a poor front-runner for the GOP presidential nomination supposed to do when all anyone in the media wants to talk about is when he’s going to announce his intentions? Why don’t interviewers ask him about shoes or ships or sealing wax—anything but that?
Conflicting accounts of the killing of German immigrants in the Hill Country during the Civil War are creating a certain amount of dis-Comfort.
Thanks to his penchant for classic literature, Wishbone is the new top dog in kids’ entertainment.
The ins and outs of Saks appeal.
A new sports bar inspires Abilenians to get something off their chest.
Stanley Marsh 3’s mobile autos.
The plane truth about airline surcharges.
Is the most outspoken member of the State Board of Education a selfless public servant or simply a prima Donna?
How to stuff a wild tortilla.
Why is it so hard for cities like Austin to hire a police chief?
Beaumont’s Tracy Byrd may be a hunky, hitmaking hat act, but if it’s all the same, he’d rather be singing an old Bob Wills tune.
For Robert James Waller, life imitates art—and irritates wife.
Which Tex sang “High Noon” and which was a member of the Manson family?
Senior editor Joe Nick Patoski provides readers with what you used to get at your local gas station: full service. Writing so-called service pieces—mini-guidebooks that offer readers do-it-yourself instructions and suggestions for trips and other leisure activities—has taken the 46-year-old resident of Wimberley all over Texas. Says Patoski: “I’ve
What happens when the modern world gets its hands on the lowly burrito? A food fad is born.
Up on federal drug charges for the second time in fifteen years, the impresario of Antone’s nightclub in Austin may finally have to face the music.
So few people, yet so many feuds.
The life and legacy of a Texas icon.
It’s still the best little town in Texas.
Has the best-known Latina writer of our day painted herself into a corner?
High peaks, scant rain, and hardpan soil—but also high art, hip hotels, and a new telescope that’s a star in its own right: Snapshots from a remote region of our state unlike anyplace else on earth.
Their mission is to save the world, not conquer it, but the stars of Xena: Warrior Princess are winning television-ratings battles from San Angelo to Slovakia. The two-year-old syndicated show airs in more than eighty countries, making Lucy Lawless, who plays Xena, the first leather-clad TV lead since the Fonz—and
MY MATERNAL GRANDMOTHER, Grandma Page, was up at three-thirty or four o’clock in the morning to bake and churn and get ready for the cotton fields on our family farm in Bloomington. At night, after all the cooking and sewing, there was energy left for her reading. “Come, Danny, I’ll
Getting published was supposed to be a cure-all, but for Austinite Louise Redd, it was just another chapter in the life of a struggling novelist.
Should Texas execute a woman? You could debate that question to death.
How I survived a course in desert survival.
The secrets of Big Bend Ranch State Park.
Until recently, I couldn’t. Then I enrolled in language school in the charming Mexican town of Guanajuato, and two weeks later I was comfortably conversant in español.
The biggest economic news in Texas is the merging of the electric and natural-gas utility industries in anticipation of the coming deregulation of electricity. Huge deals are in the works: Houston Industries, the parent of Houston Lighting and Power, is acquiring Houston-based NorAm, the nation’s third-largest gas utility; and Texas
Cash-poor PBS stations can’t seem to come up with innovative new ideas, so they ought to resurrect an innovative old one: Newsroom, the best local public- affairs program in Texas history.
For Texas’ Kuehne kids, excelling at golf is par for the course—and the least their father will accept.
Attacking the House of Yahweh: defending Texas pols.
A bat man builds a super cave (holy conservation!).
The heavenly hits of God’s Property.
A history mystery involving ranching’s King family.
By trying to have it both ways in the coup against Newt Gingrich, Dick Armey hurt the Republican party—and himself.
The governor’s media guru is accused of spousal abuse.
What respiratory ailment afflicted Jimmie Rodgers, prompting fans to shout “Spit ’er up and sing some more”?
The holiday season comes early for Asleep at the Wheel, who’ve just wrapped Merry Texas Christmas, Y’all (High Street/Windham Hill Records) at Austin’s Bismeaux studios. Highlights include Tish Hinojosa singing “Feliz Navidad” and Willie Nelson and Don Walser on “Silent Night.” Too homey for you? Wheel front man Ray Benson’s
Celebrity portraiture often requires that the subject be ready for anything. An imaginative photographer like Houston’s Pam Francis will conjure up unusual settings and costumes to best evoke her subject’s true nature, as when she lured oil tycoon Oscar Wyatt and his German shepherd to the roof of a building
Hot CDsRunning on equal parts inspiration and gumption, Austin’s Damnations are the alternative to alternative country, going way back for tunes like “Copper Kettle,” forward for a romp through Lucinda Williams’ “Happy Woman Blues,” and their own way with impressively traditional-progressive originals. The mostly acoustic Live Set (Damnations), pressed in
Willie Nelson and I have been friends for years, so why did I decide only now to make him a character in one of my mystery novels? The plot thickens.
Still plugged in.
Master builders.
Man equals myth.
Smoking out the truth.
Governed by generosity.
The ice girl cometh.