Texas Monthly articles from September 2004

Texas Monthly archives from September 2004

Up and away: what happens when a small town becomes a big town, when its population grows and its economy takes off? Much is gained--but much is lost.(Behind the Lines)
September 1, 2004... Every Texan has a favorite small town, I would be hard-pressed to choose among Hunt, near Kerrville, where the forks of the Guadalupe join and I spent three summers as a camper and a counselor; Hallettsville, halfway between Houston and San...

A royal mess.(Roar of the Crowd)(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2004... The article corresponding to the July 2004 cover brought up some interesting questions about how the rest of the world views Texans. Unfortunately, your cover very clearly answered those questions. Melody Stinsman AMARILLO Your...

Analyze this.(Roar of the Crowd)(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2004... Mimi Swartz's article in the July issue ("Them's Fightin' Words!") was a good analysis of the anti-Texas attitude out there but was perhaps a tad overly analytical. Scratch beneath the surface and you find that it isn't cowboys, "W," Texans,...

Keep the peace.(Roar of the Crowd)(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2004... Of all the people interviewed for "Peace Be With You. And Also With You. Unless You're Gay," the one I respect most is J.K. Ivey, as I've had a similar experience [July 2004]. Even though I favor same-sex blessing, I don't have AIDS, nor do I...

One child saved.(Roar of the Crowd)(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2004... Garza High School was the outstretched hand of hope that pulled my daughter through the toughest time in her young life ["One School Left Behind," July 2004]. Her two best friends died in a car accident the summer before her sophomore year. She...

For heaven's sake.(Roar of the Crowd)(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2004... Michael Ennis must not be familiar with Richard Dawkins's warning that over enthusiastic analogizing is a sign of futile crankiness ["Apocalypse Now," July 2004]. Does he seriously believe that fundamentalist Christians, who hold that...

Fuelish things.(Roar of the Crowd)(Letter to the Editor)
September 1, 2004... Via taxes and tax incentives, our federal government could have terminated our dependence on imported oil three decades ego [Behind the Lines, "Gas Pains," July 2004]. Instead, Congress and everyone else who could act have done exactly what...

Around the state.(People, Places, Events, Attractions)(Calendar)
September 1, 2004... 09.17.04 Hundreds of thousands of music worshipers who have made the pilgrimage to Zilker Park the past two years to see their idols perform at the AUSTIN CITY LIMITS MUSIC FESTIVAL will no doubt make the journey again this year. The...

P.J. O'Rourke: the political satirist will be speaking at the University of Texas at Austin on September 16.(Hey, you! Look who's coming to Texas.)(Brief Article)(Interview)
September 1, 2004... Do you consider yourself a conservative humorist or simply a humorist? I consider myself a humorist who happens to be a conservative. I think that things are just funny or they aren't. Your former governor, for whom I voted and for whom...

Lubbock.(On the road: oh, the places you should go.)(National Cowboy Symposium and Celebration)(Brief Article)(Calendar)
September 1, 2004... At the NATIONAL COWBOY SYMPOSIUM AND CELEBRATION September 9-12, some 25,000 people will converge in Lubbock to pay tribute to cowboy culture and Western history. Festivities include a horse parade, a Native American mini powwow, a chuck wagon...

Abilene.(On the road: oh, the places you should go.)(West Texas Book and Author Festival)(Brief Article)(Calendar)
September 1, 2004... Surely there's a great story to be had when more than one hundred writers get together. A romantic mystery a la Sandra Brown? A good old western via Elmer Kelton? Or maybe a meticulous historical account by way of Stephen Harrigan? At Abilene's...

Marfa.(On the road: oh, the places you should go.)(Marfa Lights Festival)(Brief Article)(Calendar)
September 1, 2004... It is difficult to tell just what Marfa's Chamber of Commerce executive director Johnny Calderen makes of the Marfa Lights. "Some people say they have held them in their hands," he says soberly. But are the locals themselves creating this...

Great small towns for ...(Texas Monthly Reporter)(exploring small Texas towns)
September 1, 2004... One of the biggest pleasures in this big state of ours is exploring its smallest towns--places where time slows down and multitasking means pondering where to have dinner while browsing the local art museum. We've scouted the territory and...

Into the woods: when I took my son to Cleveland, in East Texas, to show him the touchstones of my childhood, I discovered that the hometown I knew no longer exists--except in my memory.
September 1, 2004... "What's this?" said my fifteen-year-old son, Tyler, as he pointed to a crawdad squirming on the edge of Double Lake, one of my favorite childhood haunts near my hometown of Cleveland, in East Texas. "It's gross." [paragraph] My grandfather Dock...

O, Canadian! Once slowly dying, the Panhandle town has figured out how to turn itself into a tourist destination--thanks in large part to the peculiar love life of the lesser prairie chicken.
September 1, 2004... Back in 1997, the members of the Canadian-Hemphill County Economic Development Council (EDC) took a look at the numbers and cringed. The Panhandle town of Canadian had not known prosperity since the oil-and-gas boom of 1975-1985. There were no...

Yes in my, backyard: how Eden learned to stop worrying and love its private prison.
September 1, 2004... A city of 2,561 people 43 miles east of San Angelo, Eden has five established churches, three sit-down restaurants that all serve Tex-Mex, two motels, a grocery store, a hospital, a nine-hole golf course, and several exotic-game ranches. It's a...

Larry McMurtry: the 68-year-old novelist and screenwriter on leaving Archer City, working in Hollywood, eating in Tucson, and whether the cowboy myth is dead or alive.(Talks)(Interview)
September 1, 2004... Here we are in Tucson, Arizona, where you've been living since late last year. Let me ask the obvious: Have you left Archer City for good? That's the rumor. I should probably start by explaining why I moved hack to Archer City in 1997. I'd been...

Alive and kicking: * every summer, girls from across the state complete to win a coveted spot on the mother of all drill teams, the Kilgore Rangerettes--a Texas tradition that still has legs.
September 1, 2004... "If RANGERETTES RULED THE WORLD, there'd be so much discipline," said Lory Lyon, who was on the lower bunk bed in a dorm room at Kilgore College. * "And respect," added her friend Morgan Duplant, sitting cross-legged on the upper bunk. "The...

Wrecked: one year ago, a teenage boy plowed his pickup into an SUV just outside of Tatum, killing four of the East Texas town's most popular teenage girls. The grieving community is demanding justice, but the parents of one of the victims themselves to condemn their daughter's killer. He is also their son.
September 1, 2004... IT WAS SEPTEMBER 5, 2003, ONE YEAR AGO. A BEAUTIFUL Friday night, the wind murmuring in the trees. Many of the residents of the tiny East Texas town of Tatum (population: 1,175) were at the high school stadium to watch the Tatum Eagles play...

Reversal of fortune: forty-two residents of the struggling cotton-farming town of Roby band together to enter the lottery. They buy 430 tickets. Then--on the eve of Thanksgiving, no less--they hit the jackpot, winning $46 million. You might expect a happy ending. Not even close.
September 1, 2004... LANCE GREEN HATES FEELING LONELY, and Roby, the West Texas town where he has lived all his life, is a lonely sort of place. On the empty stretch of U.S. Highway 180 that runs through town, most of the mom-and-pop stores have gone broke. Weeds...

Sarita's secret: once the seat of a famous ranching empire, this sleepy town has kept hidden for eighty years the answer to one of South Texas's greatest riddles: is Ray Fernandez, the descendant of a Mexican maid, the heir to the gigantic Kenedy fortune?(Biography)
September 1, 2004... THE TRAIN DOESN'T STOP IN SARITA ANYMORE. They tore down the depot years ago, along with the hotel, the lumberyard, and the cotton gin. It has been a century since anyone referred to this part of South Texas as "the French Reviera of Texas," as...

Baird to the bone.(Comic)(Cartoon)
September 1, 2004... I'M TODD JASON TUCKER, BUT MY FOLKS CALL ME T.J., AND I'M THE ASSOCIATE ART DIRECTOR AT TEXAS MONTHLY, WHEN THE MAGAZINE DECIDED TO FILL A WHOLE ISSUE WITH SMALL-TOWN STORIES, THEY ASKED ME TO TALK ABOUT GROWING UP ON MY FAMILY'S RANCH NEAR...

"The buzz about Marfa is just crazy": New York hipster capitalists sipping cappuccinos with Houston superlawyers. Hollywood fashionist as enjoying works by Icelandic artists. Boutique motor courts, day, spas, and grandiose gallery openings. Yes, the West Texas town has become a playground for the urban jet set, and its future has never looked brighter. Or stranger.
September 1, 2004... When the early cowboys and ranchers got their first good look at the Marfa Plateau--the rich grasslands 4,830 feet above the desert, surrounded by far-off mountains and domed by a vast sky that made them feel both grand and puny at the same...

Pat's pick: Cafe 909.(Restaurants, Cafes, Bistros, Joints)(Restaurant Review)
September 1, 2004... I am ashamed to admit that I have sometimes been a little snarky about the quality of restaurants in small towns, but you won't find me knocking ten-month-old CAFE 909, in Marble Falls. This Central Texas newcomer is a dandy. The eclectic...

Spritz some on.(New Next)
September 1, 2004... Armani Mania for Women is a heady mix of vanilla, pink spice, and just a hint of musk. Encased in a bottle so sleek, it's a must for display on the Vanity. > Available at fine department stores.

Exquisite Ink.(New Next)
September 1, 2004... The new collection of writing instruments from Versace echoes the same sophisticated simplicity found in Versace watches and jewelry. Their distinctive rectangular shapes proudly bear the designer's familiar Medusa logo. > 877.GV5.9994,...

The dining guide.(New Next)(Directory)
September 1, 2004... POLICIES AND DEFINITIONS The Dining Guide is a service to our readers. The magazine accepts no advertising or other consideration in exchange for a listing. Reviews are written by resident critics in the cities that we list. The reviewers'...

Chip, chip, hooray!(The basics: flavors and foods you can use.)(Nacho's Especiales)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2004... In 1943 Ignacio Anaya was working as the maitre d' at the Victory Club, in Piedras Negras--across the Rio Grande from Eagle Pass--when a gaggle of officers' wives from nearby Fort Duncan strolled into the place. With no chef in sight, the...

Man about town: why do I like living "in the middle of nowhere"? The dry cleaning's cheaper, I hear stories about snakes, I meet the most colorful characters on the planet, and I never get the urge to shoot the bird. (Well ...).
September 1, 2004... In 1985, after death of my mother, I left New York for good to seek shelter in the small towns that lay scattered about the Hill Country as if they were peppered by the hand of God onto the gravy of a chicken-friend steak. In New York people...