Jan Jarboe Russell

Contributing editor Jan Jarboe Russell grew up in East Texas and joined Texas Monthly in the 1980s. Throughout her thirteen years writing for the magazine, she has covered subjects ranging from H-E-B’s “grocery wars” to a sanctuary for silent prayer in South Texas. Russell has also written for the San Antonio Express-News, Slate, and the New York Times. Her books include Lady Bird, a biography of Lady Bird Johnson; Eleanor in the Village, a portrait of Eleanor Roosevelt’s time in Greenwich Village; and The Train to Crystal City, a New York Times best-seller about a family internment camp in Texas during World War II. The Train to Crystal City won the Carr P. Collins Award in 2016.

Russell is a member of the Texas Institute of Letters and the Philosophical Society of Texas. She received Gemini Ink’s Award for Literary Excellence in 2018, and she is a member of the Daily Texan Hall of Fame at the University of Texas at Austin, her alma mater. She lives in San Antonio.