My son was jobless, directionless, and apartmentless. So when he decided to join the Army, we were just glad he was out of the house. What we didn’t know was just how much the military would change him—and us.
The essence of Texas barbecue—past and present—is in the Piney Woods.
Southeast Texas’s garlic bombs are still going strong.
The best ten barbecue joints in Texas.
The best ten barbecue joints in Texas.
When a gunman opened fire during a protest in Dallas last summer, killing five people, it was the city’s police chief who knew the words a rattled country needed to hear. In fact, he knew them all too well.
One man’s crazy quest to conquer the culinary capital of the world with smoked brisket.
Seeing, and understanding, our land and its borders anew—in a Cessna 182 Skylane.
A heart surgeon leads his city to the forefront of medical innovation.
On the coast, nothing is permanent.
Breaking ground— and betting big—on a doomsday community for the rich.
A struggling community forges a life for itself against the odds.
A filmmaker’s effort to share stories from her home turf, one female-directed movie at a time.
Twenty years ago, a brown-skinned boy was shot to death near the Rio Grande. What fate awaits my own son?
A group of young activists reclaim the language and words that have been used to define them.
How a civic-minded, cowboy-themed party came to represent an identity that’s not so easily split.
Eight epic adventures to re-wild your child.
Kerry Max Cook did everything to clear his name of a horrifying murder. So when he was finally exonerated, why did he ask for his conviction back?
He’s a billionaire. He says whatever is on his mind. He thinks he can run the country. No, it’s not Trump we’re talking about. Could Mark Cuban be our next president?
Inundated with homework and distracted by their devices, our youngest Texans (and their anxiety-prone parents) are at risk of losing their connection to our state’s many natural wonders. Here’s how to untame the next generation.
The world’s most private director turns his lens on the place where he’s always been most public: Austin.
In this exclusive excerpt from Stephen Harrigan’s forthcoming history of Texas, the first Spanish conquistadors arrive on our shores, starving, haggard, and in no mood for conquest.
From a high-end winery in Coleman and an art deco hotel in Big Spring to a bookstore in Alpine and an art museum in Canadian, some of the best places to eat, stay, and shop are in our small towns. You've just got to get out and find them.
Country singer Aaron Watson wears denim, loves two-steppin', and sings about bluebonnets without irony. Which gets him little attention in Nashville—but plenty of love everywhere else.
For many Americans, the controversial health law is government run amok. But for these people in San Antonio, it’s been a lifesaver.
The truth hurts, as historians discovered when they broke the news that Crockett surrendered.
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.
Check out our roundup of last year's best new restaurants, where you can sink your teeth into everything from jellyfish salad to the world's finest beefsteak.
The return of Terry Allen.
During the 2016 presidential campaign, much of the mainstream media failed to understand voters in Middle America. Not Dan Rather. His early recognition of Trump’s viability, and a late embrace of social media, has made the 85-year-old Wharton native more relevant than ever.
In the age of gastropubs and microbreweries, Texas still boasts a few real dive bars—where the jukebox is irreplaceable, the beer is domestic, and the patrons feel like family—if you know where to look.
Edwin Debrow committed murder at age 12. Now 37, he remains behind bars. When should a child criminal be given a second chance?
It was a year of amateurish attorneys, buck-naked burglars, credulous coal-walkers, doughnut detractors, empty-headed educators, fund-raising fabulists, grumbling graduates, hacked highway signs, ill-timed imitators, judgment-justifying Jerry Joneses, kavalier Katrinas, lime-laden locoweed, misguided mattress merchants, naive notes, outré outfits, pitmaster poseurs, questionable quarterbacks, reactive racists, slipshod spellers, taco tiffs, unwise users,
Wes Ferguson has paddled and walked all 87 miles of one of the Hill Country’s most prized waterways. In this exclusive excerpt from The Blanco River, he uncovers a few of its natural secrets.
One man's adventure in margarita-making turns into a prickly affair.
The Starlight Theatre Restaurant & Saloon has been serving its cactus margarita for so long that no one can recall its exact origins.
They have fled war-torn countries, given up livelihoods, and left behind possessions and family for the safety of a foreign world of cowboy hats and Walmarts. But the refugees who land in Amarillo’s Astoria Park have an ally who understands their confusion and loss: a 64-year-old former teacher named Miss
Beverly Pennington was a Pinterest-perfect entrepreneur whose patchwork quilts—made from people’s most treasured T-shirts—found thousands of devotees all over the country. But when the quilts stopped coming, leaving the shirts in limbo, her customers pieced together a plan to fight back.
It’s been a difficult two years in office for Texas’s attorney general. First came his indictment on multiple felonies, then an embarrassing series of missteps and staff shake-ups. Now, with his trial looming, he’s seeking salvation one live television interview at a time.
An armadillo incense burner. An Andy Warhol self-portrait. The keys to the Alamo. Who knew what startling treasures you could find without ever leaving the state?
Who needs the playoffs? After years (and years and years) of heartache, Houston has fallen for the Astros all over again.
The Dallas author on Steve Martin, Kristen Stewart, Vin Diesel, and the “good weird experience” of watching Ang Lee turn his award-winning novel into a major motion picture.
My grandfather’s work as a paleontologist took him to West Texas over and over again. Fifty years later, I found myself retracing his steps.
On Saturdays Tootsie Tomanetz cooks barbecue the old-fashioned way for legions of loyal fans. That doesn’t mean she’ll ever give up her day job.
Manuel Padilla, the Border Patrol’s new sector chief in the Rio Grande Valley, promises to stem the influx of people and drugs into Texas. That may sound fanciful, but consider this: he did it in Arizona.
Dorothy Hood was one of Texas’s greatest artists, yet her work remains largely unknown. Now, sixteen years after her death, can her fans bring her the acclaim she never received in life?
They were some of the toughest narcs on the border, known for busting smugglers, staging raids, seizing cartel cocaine—and being dirty.
He was just a regular kid in South Texas, until a brush with the law propelled Gabriel Cardona into petty crime—and the service of a drug lord rising to power across the Rio Grande. In this exclusive excerpt from Wolf Boys: Two American Teenagers and Mexico’s Most Dangerous Drug Cartel, Dan
After Texas Tech researchers discovered that windstorms may be spreading antibiotic-resistant bacteria from local feedlots, public health experts stood up and took notice. So did the Texas Cattle Feeders Association.
When a teenage boy brazenly shot two endangered whooping cranes outside Beaumont, his act unleashed widespread anger and resulted in a quick arrest—and revealed just how difficult it can be to save a species.
