Katy Vine
Katy Vine joined the staff of TEXAS MONTHLY in 1997 as an editorial assistant and became a staff writer in 2002. She has written on a range of topics including Warren Jeffs, the moon landing, bass fishing, a three-person family circus, chess prodigies, and a reclusive musician named Jandek. Her story “Alive and Kicking,” about the Kilgore Rangerettes drill team, appeared in the Best American Sports Writing 2005, the article “Brooklyn Heights,” about the high school basketball player Brooklyn Pope, was included in the Best American Sports Writing 2006, and her story “I Believe I Can Fry,” about an award-winning food inventor at the State Fair, was included in Best Food Writing 2011. Her 2005 feature story about an Odessa prostitution parlor was the inspiration for the 2010 movie “The Client List” (for which Jennifer Love Hewitt received a Golden Globe Award nomination) and a future television series. She has contributed to the Oxford American, the Texas Observer, and the radio program This American Life.
Features
Mother Knows Least
I was thrilled when my daughter began learning a second language at day care. But what was I supposed to do when my three-year-old started engaging in conversations I couldn’t understand?
The Lighthouse Drive
Miles and Miles of Texas
The Hill Country Drive, the BBQ Market Drive, the Backwoods Drive, and thirteen other summer trips, from the mountains to the coast, that will take you down some of the prettiest, most picturesque, most wide-open stretches of asphalt Texas has to offer. Buckle up!
Girls Love Me
Austin Mahone is sixteen years old. He doesn’t have a record contract, a tour bus, or a backing band. But he does have more than 650,000 followers on Twitter and the email addresses of 2,000,000 fans. Meet San Antonio’s answer to Justin Bieber.
Of Meat and Men
John Mueller was the heir to one of the great Texas barbecue dynasties. Aaron Franklin was an unknown kid from College Station who worked his counter. John had it all and then threw it all away. Aaron came out of nowhere to create the state’s most coveted brisket. Then John rose from the ashes.
The Breakfast Taco
A tribute.
Non-Prophet
When Warren Jeffs fired his attorneys and decided to represent himself in his sexual assault trial, many predicted, accurately, that he would fail miserably. Few realized just what a wild show he would put on.
The Skirmish Will Be Followed by a Ladies’ Tea
The Civil War may be 150 years old, but that doesn’t mean it can’t still stir up a fuss (Confederate license plate, anyone?). Just ask one of the hundreds of very accurately uniformed reenactors who descend on Jefferson every year to die for the cause.
The Birdman of Texas
Victor Emanuel can find you a hooded warbler, a horned guan, or maybe even an Eskimo curlew. But his real genius is that he can get you to really look at a grackle.
The Great Terquasquicentennial Road Trip
Some people call it a quartoseptcentennial, or a septaquintaquinquecentennial (seriously), but you’d better save your breath. You’ll need it on this wide-ranging 6,000-mile voyage commemorating Texas’s 175th birthday. It starts in Glen Rose, ends in Austin, and stops along the way at 175 places that tell the story of the state, from the grassy field in La Porte where independence was won to the parking garage in Dallas where the Super Bowl was dreamed up; from the Austin dorm room where Dell Inc. was born to the college hall in Houston where Barbara Jordan learned to debate; from the hotel in San Antonio where Lydia Mendoza recorded “Mal Hombre” to the—well, you get the idea. And you’d better get started. The road awaits . . .
I Believe I Can Fry
How a mild-mannered database analyst from Dallas became the undisputed king of extreme competitive deep-frying in Texas—which is to say, the world.
The State Board of Ed’s Final Exam
Our quiz shouldn’t be hard, so long as you’ve been paying attention. You have been paying attention, right?
The Bucket List
Driving the River Road, in far West Texas; having a drink at the Mansion on Turtle Creek, in Dallas; fishing for bass in Caddo Lake; eating a chicken-fried steak in Strawn; searching for a lightning whelk along the coast; and 58 other things that all Texans must do before they die.
Mother, Heal Thyself
Susan Hyde’s children were constantly in and out of the hospital with one illness or another. But were they the ones who were sick?
With God On Their Side
Last year’s child custody battle between the State of Texas and a fundamentalist Mormon sect prompted many people to wonder how 437 kids could have been ripped away from their parents. When the criminal trials of a dozen sect members get under way this month, the question may become, Was it really safe to send them home?
The 50 Greatest Hamburgers In Texas
On our first-ever quest for the state’s best burgers, we covered more than 12,000 miles, ate at more than 250 restaurants, and gained, collectively, more than 40 pounds. Our dauntless determination (and fearless fat intake) was rewarded with a list of 50 transcendent burgers—and you’ll never guess which one ended up on top. Check out our Best Burger section.
Walking on the Moon
On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin made history as the first humans to set foot on the surface of the moon. Forty years later, the researchers, astronauts, engineers, scientists, and NASA officials who made the voyage possible remember the day the Eagle landed.
Hello to a River
This Man Is Having So Much Fun!
For Steve Kemble, having as good a time as humanly possible as often as humanly possible is very serious business.
The 40 Best Small-Town Cafes
Our exhaustive, exhausting, strictly scientific (and lamentably fattening) survey of the finest home cooking around, from Maxine’s on Main, in Bastrop, to El Paraiso, in Zapata.
How Well Do You Know Your State Board of Education?
Find out by taking our quiz.
Bass-O-Matic
How a fish called Ethel (seventeen pounds, ten ounces) caught by a fishing guide named Mark (Stevenson, in 1986, on Lake Fork) revolutionized a once-sleepy sport.
BBQ08
Eighteen hungry reviewers. 14,773 miles driven/flown. 341 joints visited. Countless bites of brisket, sausage, chicken, pork, white bread, potato salad, and slaw—and vats of sauce—ingested. There are only fifty slots on our quinquennial list of the best places to eat barbecue in Texas. Only five of those got high honors. And only one (you’ll never guess which one in a million years) is the best of the best.
Faith, Hope, and Chastity
Texas receives more federal funding for abstinence education than any other state. But is teaching kids not to have sex the same as sex education?
The Class of 2017
The future according to third-graders.
The Glorie of Defeet
What Samir Patel learned in five years of not winning the national spelling bee (other than the root words of “eremacausis”).
The Music Man
How Dirk Fowler became the state’s latest, greatest poster artist.
“Oh, My God! It’s Our Children!”
On March 18, 1937, the residents of New London, southeast of Tyler, endured the worst small-town tragedy in U.S. history: an explosion at the combined junior-senior high school that killed some three hundred students and teachers. Seventy years later, 47 survivors share their memories of that horrific day.
Check Mates
Fernando Spada and Fernando Mendez are the Karpov and Kasparov of Brownsville: chess champions whose lifelong competition has produced a rivalry every bit as fierce as those of Ali and Frazier, McEnroe and Borg, or Nicklaus and Palmer. Did I mention that they’re in the fourth grade?
Acting Up
At the Giddings State School, violent teenagers come to terms with their horrific crimes—and learn how to avoid committing them again—through role-playing exercises in a jailhouse version of group therapy. This is what your tax dollars are paying for? Well, it works. For a while, at least.
Thank God It’s Friday
And Saturday. And Sunday. The arrival of fall means weekends spent watching football, up close and on-screen, and yet another opportunity to love the greatest game on earth for all the usual reasons. Forty-nine of them, in fact.
Gone in 15 Minutes
How the fire to end all fires obliterated Ringgold—and how residents of the tiny North Texas town are putting their lives back together.
Girls Gone Wild
Bobbi Jo and Jennifer were young, in love, and on the road, with the wind at their backs and a happy future ahead of them. All that stood in their way was a dead body back in Mineral Wells.
Brooklyn Heights
A one-on-one with Brooklyn Pope reveals her to be—off the court, at least—a fairly typical fifteen-year-old girl. But when the game clock starts, she’s the future of women’s basketball. Maybe basketball, period.
Return to Splendor
From humble Oak Cliff roots did a hip intellectual giant grow. In this oral history, friends and fans remember the late Grover Lewis, one of the great magazine writers of our day.
“She Had Brains, a Body, and the Ability To Make Men Love Her”
Meet the 22-year-old hooker who, with her fellow “massage therapists,” scandalized Odessa
Alive and Kicking
Although some might consider the Kilgore Rangerettes an anachronism, every summer dozens of fresh-faced teens from around the state flock to East Texas to perfect a seemingly effortless hat-brim-touching high kick—and preserve one of the state's great traditions.
McKenzie Mullins Has Cow
Which means she's an expert at reading bovine body language, and that makes her, at the absurdly young age of thirteen—only four years after overcoming her fear of horses—one of the world's best practitioners of the art of cutting.
Little Shop of Horrors
If you've ever thought of donating your body to science, read what happened at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston—and then ask yourself if a good, old-fashioned burial might not be a better idea.
Making Waves
Photographer Kenny Braun has been surfing the Gulf Coast for about thirty years. So naturally, when the water's just right, he grabs his . . . camera.
Top Fifty
Pit Stops
Where are the best places to eat barbecue in Texas? Six years ago we published a highly subjective—and hotly debated— list of our fifty favorite joints, and now we’ve gone back for seconds. Ten intrepid souls drove more than 21,000 miles in search of 2003’s worthiest ‘cue. Here’s what they came back with: the top 5 and the next 45, plus honorable mentions, great chains, and meat by mail.
Who's Next?
San Antonio's Marshevet Hooker is not just any old high school sprinter; she's an Olympic gold medalist in the making. Meet her and nine other women we're betting will lead the new Texas—and the world.
Scenes From A Mall
And not just any mall. The Marq*E Entertainment Center is a marvel of marketing: a teen-friendly hangout where kids from all over the city flock to shop, flirt, skateboard, and otherwise act their age.
Family Circus
Children of all ages! Step right up and get to know a South Texas clan whose nomadic way of life is a link to the past.
Wichita Falls to Brownsville on U.S. 281
Rare books, blueberry pie, a faith healer's shrine—and one deep hole.
Screen Gems
Mexican movies were muy caliente in the middle of the past century, and Harlingen's Rogelio Agrasanchez, Jr. has the posters to prove it.
Jay J. Armes
Dapper Bandit
On the Water Front
Summer’s blast furnace is firing up. Luckily, Texas is a paradise of spring-fed pools, sparkling beaches, and more. Here are our picks for the best places to chill out, get wet, and go off the deep end. Plus extra web-only information!
T Bone, Well Done
He's produced albums for the likes of Roy Orbison and Elvis Costello for years, but now Fort Worth's T Bone Burnett is writing songs again and composing music for movies and plays. At 53 he's on a creative roll and, as he says, "Never bored."
Love and War in Cyberspace
Brandon and Denise were not like other people. They were smarter, more introverted. They adored computers, playing games online at three in the morning with people in Finland. When they and other hard-core techies moved to Walden, a Houston apartment complex with the fastest residential Internet connection in the world, it seemed like a wired paradise. For a while, it was.
This Place Is A Zoo
Want to get up close and personal with kudus and kangaroos, tigers and toucans, okapi and orangutans? We're especially fauna these zoos, the ten best in the state.
Caldwell Zoo, Tyler
Musical Marginalia
The places, people and stories behind Texas music.
This Is living.com?
He’s worth tens of millions of dollars at age 28, but money, as they say, can’t buy happiness: Two weeks in the life of Andrew Busey, dot-com hotshot.
Museums
Bronzes by Remington and Russell in Orange, Quanah Parker’s trail bonnet in Canyon: Ten spaces that excel at the art of exhibition.
Columns | Miscellany
The Apprentice
Carrying on the legacy of the legendary musician Steve Jordan isn’t easy, especially when you’re only 22 years old and blind. But Juanito Castillo is too busy reinventing the conjunto accordion to care.
Almost Famous
When Jacob Isom swiped a Quran from an angry evangelist, he figured a few of his friends would enjoy the prank. Two months and one million YouTube views later, his life may never be the same.
Sissy Spacek
Quitman
Fear Less
Can new research predict which soldiers will suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder—and which won’t?
High Plains Snifter
After 118 years, Lubbock finally appears ready to allow liquor stores inside the city limits—unless a shutter salesman and a handful of Baptists can turn back the clock.
Access Denied
Why the closing of a footbridge to Mexico is bad for Candelaria.
Shabby Chic
Will the upscale shoppers of Plano really buy what Wal-Mart is selling?
Richard Linklater
The prison affected me personally. I grew up parking cars at the prison rodeo. I had a stepfather who was a prison guard.
A Lyrical Life
"While I was in Hollywood, I wrote for Eddie Arnold and Ernest Tubb and Roy Rogers and Tex Ritter—everybody you can think of."
Teeny Popper
"I used to think, 'I can't perform in front of these people!' And then last night I did a show for more than 13,000."
Head of the Class
How I got from the Fifth Ward to the Ivy League.
Texas Chain Saw Massacre
Dew Westbrook
The original Urban Cowboy.
Mary Kay Ash
Hot Doug
Critics praise him. Woody Allen loves him. And no one does a better Truman Capote. Meet Midland's Douglas McGrath, a writer-director who's ready to take center stage with his role in a new movie.
Chaps Schtick
How Lubbock’s Legendary Stardust Cowboy stays legendary after all these years.
Jandek and Me
Why is he a cult hero to deejays and record collectors— and why is he such a recluse? I wanted to know, so I tried to find him. And I did, in an upscale Houston neighborhood. And we drank beer.
George Lopez
The Month in Art
MAINSQUEEZE
Night Galleries
05.01.04
STRAIGHT TALK
FESTIVALS
ART
FASHION
GOING BATTY
STRAIGHT TALK
CHRISTMAS IN SAN ANTONIO
STRAIGHT TALK
Tune In
Straight Talk
Straight Talk
Fine Art
Anniversary
Straight Talk
A Great Weekend
Fine Art
Straight Talk
Nicholas Gonzalez
Nicholas Gonzalez lands a knockout role.
Heidi Grant Murphy
Heidi Grant Murphy hits a high note.
Bruce Rodgers
On the set with Bruce Rodgers.
Juan Miró
Juan Miró builds his legacy in Austin.
Mike and Gibby Cevallos
San Antonio brothers pen a sitcom that's all in the family.
Blood Brothers
Sixteen years ago, rookie filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen changed Austin with a Simple plan.
Reneé Olstead
A Houston actress launches her career.
Kevin Prigel
The Fort Worth whiz kid taken seriously on Wall Street.
Reporter
A Life at the Movies
Historic Downtown Galveston
Historic downtown Galveston
Rick Reichenbach, 65
Rick Reichenbach, lighthouse keeper.
Weldon Lister, 48
Master Engraver
Liliana Quevedo
Realtor
Juan Muñoz
Juan Muñoz, sheriff’s deputy.
Neal Shudde
54, Hatter.
Anthony Mack
Letter Carrier.
Tom “Spanky” Assiter
Auctioneer.
Being an Art Critic
Dave Hickey on being an art critic.
Wendy Warren
High school teacher.
Making Ice Cream
The CEO of Blue Bell gives us the scoop.
Catherine Rohr
A pro at helping cons.
Sixth Street and Lamar Boulevard, Austin
Sixth Street and Lamar Boulevard, Austin.
Barrel Racing
Martha Josey on the basics of barrel racing.
Whose Life Is It Anyway?
Katie Wernecke is many things: a precocious, freckle-faced Bible-drill champ; the valedictorian of her seventh-grade class in Banquete; and—since she was diagnosed with cancer last year—a pawn in the custody battle that pits her parents against the State of Texas.
Hail to the Chief
For going on five years, my admiration has grown for the weekly paper in the tiny Panhandle town of Miami (above). The New York Times it ain’t, but it tells me everything I could ever want to know about local births and deaths, windblown mail, bad potholes, and good yards. And Theo.
Monster Inc.
As mythical creatures go, Bigfoot is right up there with the Loch Ness Monster and the Abominable Snowman. But in Jefferson, the search for the hairy, hulking beast with the, er, big feet is big business—and deadly serious.
Shock Therapy
For several months, TV shrink Dr. Phil McGraw has been picking apart— in full view of his national audience—the life choices made by residents of the Central Texas town of Elgin, who are apparently too fat, too horny, and too domestically violent for their own good. The diagnoses have not been, shall we say, well received.
First in Flight
Brandon Hughey didn't ask to be a celebrity. All the San Angeloborn soldier wanted was to avoid fighting what he considered an unjust war. So he fled to Canada—and now the private's every move is public.
Fertittaville
Restaurant mogul Tilman Fertitta means to redevelop Galveston into what some say will be a Gulf Coast version of Atlantic City. No wonder he's making waves.
Queen High
A poker queen shows her hand.
Home Free
Joe Moore reflects upon truth, justice, and Tulia.
American Idle
They're ready for their close-up; are we? Our writer prejudges the thousands of celebrity wannabes at Austin's American Idol tryouts.
Jamie Foxx
Jamie Foxx pulls no punches.
Freddy Fender
Freddy Fender sings a different tune.
Richard Linklater
Katy Vine gets animated with Richard Linklater.
Check Mates
Katy Vine checks up on the UT-Dallas chess team.
Bomb Scare
Katy Vine steps through a minefield.
Plenty of Ammo
Katy Vine sits down with the former mayor of Gun Barrel City.
David Gordon Green
David Gordon Greene gets the big picture.
Ray Sexton and April Alford
Good neighbors, good fencers.
Jessica Simpson
Jessica Simpson wants to love you forever.
Andy Milburn
A Houston native who keeps score.
Lauren Anderson
A ballerina on her toes.
Blake, Tres, and Brandon Davis
One family's racket.
Maydelle Fason
Sergio Troncoso
Felonious Monk?
There’s something unorthodox—to say the least—about the Christ of the Hills Monastery in Blanco.
Judy Walgren
Drew Brees
John Patrick White
Jake Andrews
Brent and Brad Hauser
David Hale Smith
Jacob Sudhoff
Elisa Jimenez
Debbie Rice
Dianne Hardy-Garcia
Moses Malone, Jr., and George Gervin, Jr.
Luann Williams
Kristen Link and Lindsay Long
Web Exclusives
Playing the “National Game of Texas”
The Texas State Championship 42 Domino Tournament is in Hallettsville this weekend, and members of the Austin 42 Club, the largest league in the state, prepare for the big game.
Incriminating Documents
A peek at the internal FLDS documents that the state used to convict Warren Jeffs.
The Warren Jeffs Trial
Dispatches from the Warren Jeffs trial in San Angelo.
He Lost a Good Thing
Huey P. Meaux, one of the most successful and significant record producers in Texas history, died last weekend at age 82. He leaves a legacy marked by brilliant songs and some very bad decisions.
Fundamental Arguments
On October 26, the first FLDS criminal trial in Texas begins. What legal strategies remain for the defense?
The Biggest Burger Ever
It may well be at Arnold’s, in Amarillo. Think twenty pounds of unseasoned meat and some forty slices of American cheese (if you please). Can anyone say “supersize”?
This Film Is Not Yet Rated
Bob Hudgins, director of the Texas Film Commission, talks to Katy Vine about the “Waco” controversy, tax incentives, and how to get your movie made in Texas.
Kindergarten Cop-Out
The full-time pre-K bill seems like a slam dunk. The price tag: $300 million.
Let’s Talk About Sex
Ninety-four percent of Texas high school students receive abstinence-only education. More than half of these teens are losing their virginity. So what do the majority of Texans really want their kids to know about sex?
Music Man
Legalize It?
The El Paso City Council may override the mayor’s veto to create a debate on the current U.S. drug policies. In these interviews, the mayor, council members, and others explain their views.
Slow to Evolve
The reason so many Texans testified in favor of strong language supporting evolution in the TEKS is because they’re having to play defense and they’re losing.
Keep it Simple
A Q & A With Ray Charles
Assistant Editor Katy Vine tells us what he said.
Where's Walden
Assistant editor Katy Vine reveals what it was like to live for a week at Walden, an apartment complex in Houston that has the fastest residential Internet connection in the world. (See "Love and War in Cyberspace".)
Best of Austin: Get Out
From dog parks and swimming holes to picnic spots and close encounters with a llama, our favorite outdoor activities keep you busy year-round.
Wichita Falls to Brownsville on U.S. 281
Rare books, blueberry pie, a faith healer’s shrine—and one deep hole.
Texas Monthly Biz
Meetmarket.com
At Austin’s High-tech Happy Hour, the schmoozing and boozing is about finding your next job. And, maybe, landing a cute millionaire.
Generation Tech
They’re intelligent, business-savvy, techno-friendly, and young—in some cases, very young. Meet thirty Texas multimedia whizzes under thirty and four who just missed the cut.
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