In the late 1970s legendary pianist Bill Evans was at the peak of his career. He revolutionized the jazz trio (bass, piano, drums) by giving each part equal emphasis in what jazz historian Ted Gioia called a "telepathic level" of interplay. It was an ideal opportunity for a sideman, and after auditioning in 1978, Joe La Barbera was ecstatic when ......
William L. Wright (1868-1942) was born to be a Texas Ranger, and hard work made him a great one. Wright tried working as a cowboy and farmer, but it did not suit him. Instead, he became a deputy sheriff and then a Ranger in 1899, battling a mob in the Laredo Smallpox Riot, policing both sides in the Reese-Townsend Feud, and winning a gunfight at ......
AmErico Paredes (1915-1999) was a folklorist, scholar, and professor at the University of Texas at Austin who is widely acknowledged as one of the founding scholars of Chicano Studies. He was a brilliant teacher and prolific writer who championed the preservation of border culture and history. With the publication of "With His Pistol in His ......
Convict Cowboys is the first book on the nation's first prison rodeo, which ran from 1931 to 1986. At its apogee the Texas Prison Rodeo drew 30,000 spectators on October Sundays. Mitchel P. Roth portrays the Texas Prison Rodeo against a backdrop of Texas history, covering the history of rodeo, the prison system, and convict leasing, as well as ......
Based on the World War II Diary of Harry "Dirty Eddie" March, Jr., Pacific Fighter Ace
Dirty Eddie's War is the true account of the war-time experiences of Harry Andrew March, Jr., captured by way of diary entries addressed to his beloved wife, Elsa. Nicknamed "Dirty Eddie" by his comrades, he served as a member of four squadrons operating in the South Pacific, frequently under difficult and perilous conditions. Flying initially ......
Established in Waco in 1968, the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum honors the iconic Texas Rangers, a service that has existed, in one form or another, since 1823. Thirty-one individuals-whose lives span more than two centuries-have been enshrined in the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame. They have become legendary symbols of Texas and the American ......
The New Yorker recently referred to Pat Metheny as 'possibly the most influential jazz guitarist of the past five decades.' A native of Lee's Summit, Missouri, just southeast of Kansas City, Metheny started playing in pizza parlors at age fourteen. By the time he graduated from high school he was the first-call guitarist for Kansas City jazz ......
This anthology collects the ten winners of the 2020 Best American Newspaper Narrative Writing Contest at UNT's Mayborn Literary Nonfiction Conference. First place winner: Christopher Goffard, 'Detective Trapp' (Los Angeles Times) is about a complicated murder investigation and its human impact. Second place: Annie Gowen, 'Left Behind: American ......
This collection's title - as in tether, strike, eyelash, welt - is a nod to the fluidity of language and the foolish penchant we have for naming things, including ourselves. The poems refuse to navigate, choosing instead to face head-on the snares of gender, patriarchy, and parenting. In the closing environmental poems of farewell, the speaker ......
