Cecilia Ballí
Stories
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.
Widowed at 38, a Mexican citizen with no money and a sixth-grade education, she raised three proud American daughtersand embraced life on her own terms.
The U.S. Census Bureau says that Cameron Park, a Brownsville colonia, is the poorest community in Americaand yet optimism thrives there. How do you explain to statisticians and demographers that poverty is a relative thing?
Julián and Joaquin Castro's résumés look as similar as they do: degrees from Stanford and Harvard, billable hours logged at a tony law firm, and now, promising careers in San Antonio politics. Nothing could please their mother more.
When I moved to Houston two years ago, I was expecting little in the way of Hispanic culture. Who knew it was such a good city for Latinosbetter, even, than San Antonio?
To residents of Presidio and Ojinaga, the international border that separates them had always seemed irrelevant. They crossed it easily, spoke the same language, and considered themselves part of the same community. When Mexican authorities wrongly imprisoned a Texas grocer in April, that relationship changed dramatically—and it hasn't been the same since.
In March 1836, 342 men fighting for Texas
independence surrendered to Mexican general
José de Urrea. A week later they were shot on orders of Santa Anna. Was it a massacre, as generations of schoolchildren have been taught, or an execution? The question has divided a historic Texas
town.
For years my relatives have claimed that they were robbed of oil and gas royalties on Padre Island. Last May a Brownsville jury agreed, vindicating—for now—the family's proud heritage and proving that, sometimes, the little guy does win.