Over the past two decades Texas has exonerated more than eighty wrongfully convicted prisoners. How does this happen? Can anything be done to stop it? We assembled a group of experts (a police chief, a state senator, a judge, a prosecutor, a district attorney, and an exoneree) to find out.
ROUTE: Turkey to Lubbock (the long way) DISTANCE: 366 miles NUMBER OF COUNTIES: 13 WHAT TO LISTEN TO: Buddy Holly’s That’ll Be the Day and Waylon Jennings’s Ol’ WaylonWest Texas is the Texas of wide-open spaces, but it is also the Texas of music giants, starting in the Rolling Plains
The Birding DriveBy Patricia SharpeROUTE: Mission to South Padre IslandDISTANCE: 89 milesNUMBER OF COUNTIES: 2WHAT TO READ: David Allen Sibley’s The Sibley Guide to BirdsHugging the U.S.-Mexico border in far South Texas, the sultry stretch of land known as the Lower Rio Grande Valley is the Casablanca of the bird
ROUTE: Port Arthur to Port AransasDISTANCE: 308 milesNUMBER OF COUNTIES: 11WHAT TO BRING: A pair of binocularsI started as far east as you can go on the Gulf Coast and still be in Texas. And since the Sabine Pass Lighthouse, which is technically across the state line in Louisiana, is
ROUTE: West of Ozona to Sanderson DISTANCE: 85 miles NUMBER OF COUNTIES: 3 WHAT TO READ: James H. Evans’s Crazy From the HeatA drive whose sole purpose is to experience the simple pleasure of being behind the wheel has a few requirements. The route must lead west, because that’s the
ROUTE: Bandera to Concan (and back)DISTANCE: 125 milesNUMBER OF COUNTIES: 3WHAT TO LISTEN TO: 104.3 FM, the RanchA great drive may be about slowing down and clearing your head, but who can resist roads lined with signs warning of “Earth Slides” and “Steep Grades, Sharp Curves”? Born of massive geological
ROUTE: Uncertain to JasperDISTANCE: 140 milesNUMBER OF COUNTIES: 6WHAT TO LISTEN TO: Jim Reeves’s “Welcome to My World”If you want to see, smell, and taste the Deep South, look no further than East Texas. Start your drive in Uncertain, but before you even get behind the wheel, take a short
ROUTE: Fort Belknap to Red Bluff ReservoirDISTANCE: 505 milesNUMBER OF COUNTIES: 15WHAT TO READ: J. Evetts Haley’s Charles Goodnight: Cowman and PlainsmanIn the rolling country northwest of the Palo Pinto Mountains, nestled along FM 61, stand the barracks of Fort Belknap. It was from this outpost, in 1860, that a
ROUTE: Paris to DecaturDISTANCE: 148 milesNUMBER OF COUNTIES: 6WHAT TO READ: Michael Andrews’s Historic Texas CourthousesWhenever I start to suffer the ill effects of traffic overload and endless status updates on my smartphone, I set out for a quieter, quainter place that has at least two of the following: a
As the man known to the world as Dallas's J. R. Ewing fends off throat cancer, he gears up to reprise the role that turned him into an icon and looks back on one of the most extraordinary—and eccentric—lives in show business.
Austin Mahone is sixteen years old. He doesn’t have a record contract, a tour bus, or a backing band. But he does have more than 650,000 followers on Twitter and the email addresses of 2,000,000 fans. Meet San Antonio’s answer to Justin Bieber.
The Hill Country Drive, the BBQ Market Drive, the Backwoods Drive, and thirteen other summer trips, from the mountains to the coast, that will take you down some of the prettiest, most picturesque, most wide-open stretches of asphalt Texas has to offer. Buckle up!
Violent mockingbirds, farm-to-market roads, football versus lacrosse, and the incredible nerve of storekeepers who charge for spit cups.
You might think they’re invincible, but Texas Republicans could soon find themselves in peril. At least that’s what Steve Munisteri says. And he should know.
Five years ago, Hannah Overton, a church-going Corpus Christi mother of five, was convicted of murdering her soon-to-be adoptive child and sentenced to life in prison. In April, she returned to court—and watched her lawyers put the prosecution on defense.
On November 5, 2009, Nader Hasan’s cousin Nidal Hasan killed thirteen people at Fort Hood. Kerry Cahill’s father, Michael, was one of the victims. Today, Nader and Kerry are unlikely allies.
There’s more to Texas politics than Rick Perry. Gail Collins's new book demonstrates that the Northeastern media establishment doesn't understand that.
Walden, who grew up in Austin, was the salutatorian of her class at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. After completing an aesthetic surgery fellowship at the Manhattan Eye, Ear, and Throat Hospital, she built a successful practice in New York City, then returned to her hometown in
Houston and that brilliant artist of light James Turrell have proved to be an enduring couple, what with the California native’s inspiring work at the Live Oak Friends Meeting house and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. But the Skyspace installation Turrell created to honor Rice University’s centennial is perhaps
FIRST COMES THE ARCHED eyebrow. Then the significant pause. Then the question: “Well, how was it?” This is the reaction of my Austin friends when they hear I’ve been to the Houston location of Uchi, Texas’s restaurant of the moment. Yes, Austin is eaten up with curiosity and jealousy, poor
A Robert Johnson Tribute, International Surfing Day, Juneteenth, and Cocktail Week in Dallas . . .
Concerto in Eight Courses, Rodney Crowell, and the Texas Blueberry Festival . . .
The Austin-based singer-songwriter talks about her new autobiography, Diamond in the Rough, and her sixth studio album.
The city is home base for a growing community of young filmmakers, who are making their mark on the independent film scene.
Shuttlebration, the Lone Star Uke Fest, and A Tribute to Elvis . . .
Including new sets from Alejandro Escovedo, Rhett Miller, and more.
The Homegrown Music and Arts Festival, Jimmie Vaughan, and the South Texas Heritage Center . . .
The Los Angeles–based photographer spent more than twenty days driving all across the state and tells us what he saw.
The senior editor on her glimpse into Austin Mahone's rise to teen pop stardom in a world where YouTube and Twitter are making adults in the music business scratch their heads.
“And with that I threw in a big dip of Copenhagen, cracked open a cold Lone Star, and knew I was home.”
About a year ago, it was reported that Randall Dale Adams had died, bringing to a close one of the more tragic stories in recent Texas history. A construction worker from Ohio, Adams (pictured here, in 1989) was convicted and sentenced to die in 1977 for the murder of Dallas
