The matriarch of one of the most important families in Texas history, Petra Vela Kenedy has remained a shadowy presence in the annals of South Texas. In this biography of Petra Vela Kenedy, the authors not only tell her story but also relate the history of South Texas through a woman's perspective. Utilizing previously unpublished letters, journals, photographs, and other primary materials, the authors reveal the intimate stories of the families who for years dominated governments, land acquisition, commerce, and border politics along the Rio Grande and across the Wild Horse Desert.
From...

Known as "The Emerald City," Dallas has its own rich heritage peculiar to its founding on the prairies and the Trinity River, and editor Frances Brannen Vick has collected a cornucopia of all things Big D in "Literary Dallas," the third in TCU Press's "literary cities" series.
There is C. C. Slaughter who helped make Dallas a banking center; John Rosenfield, who made his city a haven for performing arts; Evelyn Oppenheimer, who made her career reviewing books; not to mention Frank X. Tolbert, both Chili King and writer.
Natalie Ornish writes of the merchants who made Dallas a city...

Almost every journalist asks the subjects of profiles to tell the truth.
Only Mary Rogers requires them to "dance naked."
To Rogers, an award-winning columnist for the "Fort Worth Star-Telegram," that term signifies a pact between the writer, the subject and the reader: only when stories eliminate artifice and express honest beliefs and emotions can they merit attention and trust. It's a phrase and philosophy unique to Rogers, and as a result the stories in "Dancing Naked: Memorable Encounters with Unforgettable Texans" are unique, too. You've never read anything like them, and...

In the summer of 1881, Robert Justus Kleberg rode across the hot, dusty South Texas brush country to the palatial home of Capt. Richard King to consult with the cattle baron about attending to his legal affairs. On that same journey, the young lawyer also first laid eyes on Alice King, "Princess of the Wild Horse Desert." Neither of their lives would ever be the same.Published for the first time in this book, the love letters written by Kleberg to Alice Gertrudis King provide a glimpse of the lives of two of the most influential people in Texas history. Editors Jane Clements Monday and...