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April 30, 2002
“A Bunch of Junk” [January 1986]
Dallas' cultural aspirations take a beating when city fathers reject a sculpture.
16 Articles
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April 30, 2002
Dallas Is Better Than Houston [February 1978]
TRY TO REMEMBER, BILL, Hell and Houston both begin with a h. —letter from a 19th-century visitorI wish I’d said it first, but I can’t say it any better. It still begins with a h. Houston today is a dozen cities, and you couldn’t give me any of them if
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April 30, 2002
God’s Country [November 1975]
WHEN I WAS GROWING UP there in the Thirties and Forties, Abilene was a one-industry town: God.God met the biggest payroll and He was the local real estate magnate. Besides owning the fifty church buildings and employing the people in them, He held title to the three institutions of higher
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April 30, 2002
The Highland Park Woman [April 1976]
THE HIGHLAND PARK WOMAN is thirty-two or thirty-three. She says she honestly forgets sometimes. She’s not particularly afraid to tell her age (she’s not that old) but she seldom does. It’s not really necessary: a ten-year-old son in St. Mark’s and a seven-year-old daughter in Lamplighter, three bedrooms and three
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April 30, 2002
Jesus and Mead’s Fine Bread [May 1983]
WHEN UPON LIFE’S BILLOWS you are tempest tossed, When you are discouraged, thinking all is lost . . . Count your many blessings, ev’ry doubt will fly, And you will be singing as the days go by.— “Count Your Blessings”My first check as a radio gospel singer on KRBC in
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April 30, 2002
Old Times [November 1987]
WHY IS IT YOU NEVER REMEMBER the good things about certain jobs, only the bad—and yet the sweetest times, the days of your life you think you’d rather live over, are those seasons when salaries were lowest, the bosses were cruelest, your fellow workers were the most problematic? I spent
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April 30, 2002
Upwardly Mogul [November 1976]
THREE YEARS AGO ANYBODY in the business could describe a Texas movie producer for you: loud talking, fast moving (white Eldorado), Frye boots, and a rodeo shirt to match his California girl friend’s; born in Brooklyn (where else?), with two quickies to his credit—one that four-walled Waco, Temple, and died,
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April 30, 2002
Why Dallas? [December 1973]
A RIVER BEGAN IT. Sluggish in summer, scant. A red and awesome terror in a wet spring. Too much river . . . or not enough.Called Daycoa by some Indians, Arkikosa by others, in 1690 Alonso de Leon, a Mexican-born officer of the Spanish crown, bestowed its modern name: La
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April 30, 2002
The Fifty Best Texas Books [August 1981]
THESE ARE MY CHOICES FOR the fifty best Texas books. I would like to emphasize that these are the best books about Texas. By that I mean Texas is their main subject or, in the case of fiction and biography, their chief setting. They are not the best books written
News & Politics
November 1, 1987
Old Times
Before the Dallas newspaper war, the Herald was full of character—or was it characters?
Religion
April 30, 1983
Jesus and Mead’s Fine Bread
I sang gospel music for God, a bakery, and $6 a week.
Books
July 31, 1981
The Fifty Best Texas Books
One man’s favorite writings span a century and capture Texas in all its grimness and glory.
Texas History
February 1, 1978
Dallas Is Better Than Houston
Big D is not called Big D for nothing.
Business
November 1, 1976
Upwardly Mogul
The tale of the man who made Dallas a film industry capital is no shaggy-dog story.
Style & Design
April 1, 1976
The Highland Park Woman
Splendor in the suburbs.
Being Texan
November 1, 1975
God’s Country
Abilene, Abilene, strangest town I’ve ever seen.