General William R. Shafter was no gallant hero. He drank, gambled, swore, got into fights with his men. They nicknamed him for the river that was one of his targets: "Pecos Bill." He was accused of trying to start a war with Mexico and became involved in an embezzlement case. Associated with military blunders during the Spanish-American War, he has often been pictured as a fat, incompetent buffoon.
But Shafter, if coarse and abrasive, was a man who got results. A winner of the Congressional Medal of Honor, he served in the Army for forty years, from the Civil War to the Spanish-American...

For the Plains Indians, the period from 1750 to 1890, often referred to as the traditional period, was an evolutionary time. Horses and firearms, trade goods, shifting migration patterns, disease pandemics, and other events associated with extensive European contact led to a peak of Plains Indian influence and success in the early nineteenth century. Ironically, that same European contact ultimately led to the devolution of traditional Plains Indian society, and by 1870 most Plains Indian peoples were living on reservations. In The Plains Indians Paul H. Carlson charts the evolution and...

"Carlson writes well in a style that lends itself to an understanding of how man got to the high plains, and what he did once he arrived. Highly recommended reading." New Mexico Historical NotebookHumans have visited the Texas High Plains, and in particular the upper Brazos River region, for nearly twelve thousand years. At the site of the Lubbock Lake Landmark in the long Yellow House Draw, they camped, hunted game, and sought shelter from harsh winter weather.In this brief, readable history, Paul H. Carlson surveys the Lubbock Lake Landmark s long geologic past, placing emphasis on human...

"Carlson writes well in a style that lends itself to an understanding of how man got to the high plains, and what he did once he arrived. Highly recommended reading." New Mexico Historical NotebookHumans have visited the Texas High Plains, and in particular the upper Brazos River region, for nearly twelve thousand years. At the site of the Lubbock Lake Landmark in the long Yellow House Draw, they camped, hunted game, and sought shelter from harsh winter weather.In this brief, readable history, Paul H. Carlson surveys the Lubbock Lake Landmark s long geologic past, placing emphasis on human...

General William R. Shafter was no gallant hero. He drank, gambled, swore, got into fights with his men. They nicknamed him for the river that was one of his targets: "Pecos Bill." He was accused of trying to start a war with Mexico and became involved in an embezzlement case. Associated with military blunders during the Spanish-American War, he has often been pictured as a fat, incompetent buffoon.
But Shafter, if coarse and abrasive, was a man who got results. A winner of the Congressional Medal of Honor, he served in the Army for forty years, from the Civil War to the Spanish-American...

Black Americans arrived in West Texas in the early sixteenth century and nearly five centuries later continue to contribute to the region that shares so many characteristics with the western United States. Despite that distinguishing feature, no published study covers the lives of African Americans in West Texas. This volume, Slavery to Integration: Black Americans in West Texas, seeks to fill that gap. Slavery to Integration consists of twelve articles depicting the basic themes and topics of the black American experience in West Texas. Drawing articles from the West Texas...

In "Empire Builder in the Texas Panhandle," author Paul H. Carlson tells the story of Chicago-based William Henry Bush and his role in shaping development of the Texas Panhandle from the 1880s to the 1930s. In 1881, Bush secured interest in the sprawling Frying Pan Ranch -- a ranch that covered two counties and bordered what would later become Amarillo. The ranch's unlikely new owner from the north was a clothing wholesaler, real estate developer, philanthropist, and fledgling cattleman. As an outsider, he brought his business savvy and vision of civic growth to bear on one of America's last...

"Celebrating the celebration of the Old West"
In the 1880s, there wasn't much in Anson, Texas, in the way of entertainment for the area s cowhands. But Star Hotel operator M. G. Rhodes changed that when he hosted a Grand Ball the weekend before Christmas. A restless traveling salesman, rancher, and poet from New York named William Lawrence Chittenden, a guest at the Star Hotel, was so impressed with the soiree that he penned his observances in the poem The Cowboys Christmas Ball.
Reenacted annually since 1934 based on Chittenden s poem, the contemporary dances attract people from...

Paul Carlson engagingly chronicles the developmentof the range sheep and goat industry from Spanish times to about 1930, when widespread use of mesh-wire fences brought an end to the open-range management of sheep and goat ranches in Texas.