An early castaway described Padre Island as “a wretched, barren sandbank.” It’s better known today as the Gold Coast of Texas, but its identity is still rooted in wildness and age-old solitude.

Starting with his alma mater and using little more than charm, Robert Hicks conned the college fund-raising industry out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. His name is mud at A&M.

It seems practically impossible to choose the best deal from the multitude of services offered by all the new long distance phone companies. But we’ve got their number.

Looking for a sport that offers plenty of cheap thrills and wacky challenges but requires no training, no equipment, and no big bucks? Try miniature golf.

Maybe the mayhem generated by a trio of battling boys is just their idea of brotherly love.

An interpretation of a classic genre.

Forget about waltzing across Texas. Let’s two-step instead.

One man’s whim-turned-obsession is changing Houston’s McKee Street Bridge and its faded environs into one of the few really original artistic images of the city.

Labor’s nuke.

A new recruit to the ranks of Mary Kay beauty consultants struggles valiantly to do his part in reaching the woman of the eighties and keeping the company in the pink.

Sometimes the opera is over before the fat lady sings. Consider the successful debut of sixteen brief and eclectic works commissioned by the Texas Opera Theater.

Prizzi’s Honor is a macabre satire of the two-career marriage; Cocoon can’t burst free of its nice-guy limitations; Pale Rider recycles all the wrong western riffs; St. Elmo’s Fire should have been doused from the start.

Though he fought against bad management, bad coaching, and bad habits, he finally struck out at baseball, the victim of too much too soon.

Hungry ants in the Panhandle; cocky dispatchers in Dallas; tiny trees near San Antonio.

Through his small, simply produced literary magazine, poet David Yates made his mark—both in Texas and beyond.
Peter Applebome

Houston police chief Lee Brown is doing things right; crime is down, public approval is up.

Triathletes converge upon Lake Lavon to compete in the sport of the eighties.

Taking the plunge; defending Diana; grading the tests; reforming the system.

Every phone a pay phone; look out, Clinton Manges; the GOP donnybrook; party realignment in San Antonio.

Go ahead—thing big!