Eric Benson began writing for Texas Monthly in 2014 and joined the magazine's staff as a senior editor in 2018. He has covered scientists in Houston, imams in Dallas, boxers in San Antonio, and citizen journalists in Reynosa, Mexico. His cover story on immunologist James P. Allison won best profile at the 2017 National City and Regional Magazine Awards.
Vegans want to end the killing of animals. Scientists say livestock are accelerating climate change. COVID-19 is ravaging meat-packers. Texas beef is under fire—but all across the industry, from the pasture to the butcher case, a vision of more sustainable burgers and briskets is beginning to come into focus.
Laredo cardiologist Ricardo Cigarroa is on the front lines of the COVID-19 crisis, making house calls and “dealing hard doses of truth.”
And they've been dangerously slow to respond to the coronavirus.
An interview with Dell Medical School's William Tierney on getting the National Guard to deliver groceries and the fear of “crying wolf."
Rhodes was an unproven 27-year-old chef when he launched Indigo, a tiny restaurant with a radical concept in a low-income Houston neighborhood. Now it's one of the hottest kitchens in the country.
Radio host Kristopher Hart’s dream flight shows the range of what’s possible from Texas whiskey distilleries.
A decade ago, there was no Texas whiskey. Today, the state’s craft distillers are making world-class bourbons and single malts—and slick imitators are trying to stake a claim.
Will Hurd is exactly the kind of politician the Republican party’s establishment once dreamed about being their future. In March 2013, the Republican National Committee, reeling from defeat in the 2012 elections, published a postmortem report laying out an agenda for a new kind of…
New PBS space-race documentary ’Chasing the Moon’ highlights her challenges as the only woman in Mission Control.
Without state funding for census outreach, communities across Texas are trying on their own to make sure everyone gets counted.
Fifty years after man walked on the Moon, mankind is still stranded on Earth. That’s not the way it was supposed to be.
Texas stands to lose a great deal if the 2020 Census doesn’t include every Texan—including congressional seats and billions in federal funding.
A Q&A between filmmaker David Modigliani and Texas Monthly's Eric Benson, who followed O'Rourke for the 2018 'Underdog' podcast.
In the series’ debut episode, a trio of military veterans from the Valhalla Club invite comedian and TV host Jordan Klepper into the ring.
The strengths of Beto O'Rourke's senate candidacy have been cast in a harsher light now that he's a presidential contender.
The outspoken congressman left a promising career in the CIA and became a rising Republican star. But his political balancing act is dicier than ever.
Beaver Aplin built the quirky convenience chain into a Texas empire. Will his tactics translate outside the state?
John Cornyn may be vulnerable and 2020 looks even better than 2018 for Democrats—but who will run?
The El Pasoan who would be senator isn’t done yet.
Is Thomas J. Henry an unrepentant huckster, or is he a righteous warrior for the little guy? Can he be both?
It’s the greatest honor the Houston-based cancer immunologist can imagine—even more than playing onstage with Willie Nelson.
Brownsville police officer Valerie Rivas was charged with smuggling her undocumented boyfriend. She’s been acquitted. He’s likely to be deported.
The AirHogs were a small-time professional team of ex-minor- and major-leaguers in Grand Prairie. Then the Chinese arrived.
In his latest book, the author doesn't pull punches with either political party.
In her twenties, Dallas filmmaker Augustine Frizzell was a single mom and struggling actor. Now 39, she’s poised to conquer Hollywood.
David and Nathan Zellner have made it as indie filmmakers in their own under-the-radar way. Now they’re going mainstream (sort of), with the Robert Pattinson–starring western ‘Damsel.’
The Democratic Senate candidate led a march to the new Tornillo facility holding immigrant children, but he doesn't have a full picture of what's going on inside.
From a breastaurant to a thriller featuring puppets, here are eight movies from Texans to watch this summer.
The rural noir, in which working-class investigators tackle in-your-face racism in East Texas, may be on the verge of cancellation.
The former Texas A&M star tries to move beyond his past in a scrappy Austin development league.
Observing the ATF’s disastrous assault on David Koresh and the Branch Davidian compound should have made John McLemore’s career. Instead, it ruined it. Maybe that was for the best.
Branch Davidians Clive Doyle and Sheila Martin lost almost everything in the Waco fire, but not their faith.
The Austin bomber's unknown motive is part of a larger pattern by those who commit violence.
A quarter century after 82 Branch Davidians and 4 federal officers died outside Waco, retired FBI agent Byron Sage still can't stop thinking—and arguing—about what happened.
The night was packed with Hollywood luminaries who have a soft spot for Texas.
The El Paso congressman is waging a long-shot campaign to prove a Democrat can win in Texas.
Texas football made the former ’Friday Night Lights’ actor a heartthrob. Will a Texas tragedy make him a bona fide star in 'Waco'?
Serving up smoked-kimchi-and-chicken stew in the middle of the storm.
Texas used to be a quarterback wasteland. Now the state turns out more ace QBs than any other state. Here’s how.
The world’s most private director turns his lens on the place where he’s always been most public: Austin.
You’ve probably heard about the bathroom bill—and you’re going to hear a lot more—but here’s a behind-the-scenes look at the legislature and the politicians, lobbyists, agitators, and donors who really run the show.
Talking with former U.S. ambassador Antonio Garza about what Trump means for Mexico—and Texas.
Congressman Filemon Vela had always kept a low profile—until he told Donald Trump to stick his border fence you-know-where.
Jim Allison has always gone his own way—as a small-town-Texas kid who preferred books to football, and as a young scientist who believed the immune system could treat tumors when few others did. And that irreverence led him to find a potential cure for cancer.
The country’s largest group of Muslims live in Texas, yet many of them don’t feel welcome here. A few young and progressive leaders—like Irving imam Omar Suleiman—are working to change that.
After the Kennedy assassination, Dallas became known as the City of Hate. After the 7/7 shootings, how will it be judged?
A brief oral history of the television show based on Joe R. Lansdale's books—and how Hollywood learned to love the Nacogdoches native.
How the kindest, gentlest family man in Nacogdoches began writing some of the creepiest, grisliest fiction in the country.
