Gone From Texas

Gone to Texas: A History of the Lone Star State engagingly tells the story of the Lone Star State, from the arrival of humans in the Panhandle more than 10,000 years ago to the opening of the twenty-first century. Focusing on the state's successive waves of immigrants, the book offers an inclusive view of the vast array of Texans who, often in conflict with each other and always in a struggle with the land, created a history and an idea of Texas. An Instructor's Resource Manual and a set of approximately 400 PowerPoint slides to accompany Gone to Texas, Third Edition, are now available to adopters. Please contact your local Oxford University Press representative for details.

Josey Wales is out for the blood of the pro-Union Jayhawkers who raped & murdered his wife. When Wales refuses to surrender, he begins a life on the run from the law, reluctantly befriending a diverse group of whites & Indians on his quest for revenge and a new life.

Josey Wales was the most wanted man in Texas. His wife and child had been lost to pre-civil War destruction and, like Jesse James and other young farmers, he joined the guerrilla soldiers of Missouri--men with no cause but survival and no purpose but revenge. Josey Wales and his Cherokee friend, Lone Watie, set out for the West through the dangerous Camanchero territory. Hiding by day, traveling by night, they are joined by an Indian woman named Little Moonlight, and rescue an old woman and her granddaughter from their besieged wagon. The five of them travel toward Texas and win through brash and honest violence, a chance for a new way of life.

NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST • The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Looming Tower—and a Texas native—takes us on a journey through the most controversial state in America. • “Beautifully written…. Essential reading [for] anyone who wants to understand how one state changed the trajectory of the country.” —NPR Texas is a red state, but the cities are blue and among the most diverse in the nation. Oil is still king, but Texas now leads California in technology exports. Low taxes and minimal regulation have produced extraordinary growth, but also striking income disparities. Texas looks a lot like the America that Donald Trump wants to create. Bringing together the historical and the contemporary, the political and the personal, Texas native Lawrence Wright gives us a colorful, wide-ranging portrait of a state that not only reflects our country as it is, but as it may become—and shows how the battle for Texas’s soul encompasses us all.

With three national championships, more than 80 All-American and nearly 800 victories, the University of Texas has a football history and tradition among the richest in the nation. This book offers a look at a small slice of that history and tradition, with updates on the lives of those who made it possible. Among these are: Johnny Treadwell, whose Now we've got 'em where we want 'em challenge became the emblem of the Darrell Royal teams of the early 1960s; former head coach David McWilliams, whose departure from the coaching ranks may have eventually helped to save his life; Duke Carlisle, the star of three crucial showdowns in a national championship season, now enjoying life in the oil business in Mississippi; Julius Whittier, UT's first black football letterman, who finished with two degrees and has been a successful Dallas attorney for 20 years: Ben Tompkins, who played baseball with Satchel Paige, spent 20 years as an NFL game official, and is still practicing law at 75; T Jones enshrined in the Hall of Honor at both UT and Texas Tech; Ben Procter, who held a UT receiving record for 40 years still lives in house he bought from Lyndon Johnson's sister, and is finishing up the second volume of a biography of William Randolph Hearst; Alan Lowry, who answers the gnawing question about whether he stepped out of bounds on the run that beat Alabama in the Cotton Bowl; James Saxton, the swift All-American who survived a near-fatal illness; Roosevelt Leaks, who after a lengthy NFL career still spends time on the family farm where he grew up; the Campbell twins, who as the sons of defensive coordinator Iron Mike Campbell, willed themselves into becoming starters on a nationalchampionship team; Randy Peschel, the man who caught Right 53 Veer Pass; James Street, the man who threw it; and former Outland winner Scott Appleton, who destroyed his life with alcohol and then rebuilt it, becoming a minister who touched countless lives before his death.

A broad and dramatic saga of the American westward migration to Texas between 1817 and 1825, this is the story of 300 families who made their way from all across the United States and four countries to settle in Austin's Colony in Mexican Texas. An in-depth, personal look at the families, this adventure considers why they came to Texas, how they got here, and what they shared together in the early years. Most of their stories begin a decade before their arrival on the banks of the Colorado and Brazos Rivers, from action during the War of 1812, through the early Texas filibusters and expeditions, and under the guidance of Moses Austin and his son Stephen F. Austin. It is at once a story of courage and sacrifice, dangers and tragedy, dedication to a dream and desire for a fresh beginning. The story is diverse and filled with unexpected surprises for both traveler and reader. There are American Indians resisting the settlers, pirates on the prowl, earthquakes and hurricanes and deadly floods taking their toll. These first mostly Anglo settlers included large families, young newlyweds, and single men in commercial partnerships, widows and widowers, the very young and the very old. Some brought slaves, some came destitute, and some came rich and eager. There were the scurrilous and the fugitives among the lot, all collectively signing on to Austin's Colony as the iconic Old 300. Author Paul N. Spellman teaches Texas History at Wharton County Junior College in Richmond, Texas.