Southwest

Two Centuries of Victoria’s History

While Stephen F. Austin often receives sole credit as the founding father of the Lone Star State, there was another successful empresario, Don Martin De Leon, who established the only predominantly Mexican colony in the state. Founded on the Guadalupe River, Victoria’s rich heritage has often been set aside, just as the De Leon family itself endured an unjust period of exile after the success of a revolution they helped support. From the origin of the Street of Ten Friends and the advent of the streetcar to more recent triumphs and tragedies, Tamara Joy Diaz chronicles the influential figures and pivotal events of Victoria’s past.

An in-depth look at frontier life in Eastern Oklahoma. At the dawn of the nineteenth century, a steady stream of new arrivals began making their way into the rugged lands of Eastern Oklahoma. European settlers and the tribes who were forcibly relocated to the territory after 1830 established new lives alongside the Native Americans indigenous to the region. Their biographies make up an often untold story of two hundred years of Oklahoma history. From the origin of towns and commercial enterprises to profiles of pioneers both prominent and obscure, Ronald R. Switzer highlights the diversity and determination of the people who grappled for success in the early days of the Oklahoma frontier.

Make a crossing of the storied Pecos River.

The arid Pecos River Country of Texas is rich with stories, the crooked path of its alkaline waters defining the lives of any who dared venture here. Native peoples, Spanish explorers, soldiers, travelers, cattlemen, wildcatters, and just plain folks, passed by, struggled, sojourned, and perished. From the oldest book in North America to the great rock of the Jumano, their traces remain in the ruins, the records and the earth itself. Native West Texan James Collett catalogues architectural masterpieces, lonely gravestones, fanciful cowboy tales and other bits of history caught in the currents of a legendary river.

The middle Texas coast, known locally as the Coast Bend, is an area filled with fascinating stories. From as early as the days of de Vaca and La Salle, the Coastal Bend has been a site of early exploration, bloody conflicts, legendary shipwrecks and even a buried treasure or two. However, much of the true history has remained unknown, misunderstood and even hidden. For years, local historian C. Herndon Williams has shared his fascinating discoveries of the area's early stories through his weekly column, Coastal Bend Chronicle. Now he has selected some of his favorites in Texas Gulf Coast Stories. Join Williams as he explores the days of early settlement and European contact, Karankawa and Tonkawa legends and the Coastal Bend's tallest of tall tales.

Encounter fascinating characters and forgotten stories from the Texas Hill Country’s past, before the crowds and amenities made life complicated.

Settled by German immigrants in the 1840s, Fredericksburg’s corner of the Texas Hill Country bustles with the trendy energy of an international tourist destination. But there was a time not long ago when the quiet community remained off the beaten path, even if it continued to draw in luminaries like O. Henry, Buck Taylor and Bob Hope. A working knowledge of Town Creek German wasn’t necessary, but it sure came in handy. From the White Elephant Saloon to the 87 Drive-In, Michael Barr tours the bygone byways of the Hill Country, showcasing the heritage that predates the overbooked wine tours and vacation rentals.

The Old Pueblo's history is full of colorful characters and fascinating folktales!.

Tucson was originally settled in 1775, and the Gadsden Purchase brought the tiny settlement on the Santa Cruz River into the United States in 1854. In the decades leading up to Arizona's statehood in 1912, the territory's largest city was rife with excitement. A seven-headed, four-hundred-foot-long sea serpent prophesied to the townsfolk. Lady bicyclists caused an uproar with their "divided skirts.'? The new railroad brought three presidents to town. From the city's brief time in the Confederacy to its crusades against drinking and gambling, from bullfighting rings to sanitariums, author Dave Devine relates stories of the little-known, sometimes lighthearted and often unusual events and personalities of Tucson.

A saloon town like no other.

Carved out of the wilderness to become the first capital of Arizona Territory, Prescott has been a magnet for colorful characters since 1864. From Isaac Goldberg, proprietor of the first saloon, to musical icon Bruce Springsteen, Prescott has hosted its fair share of legends. Highwayman Brazen Bill Brazelton moseyed through the streets of Prescott, as did Bucky O’Neill and Barry Goldwater. Famous landmarks like the Palace Saloon not only survived prohibition but the Great Fire of 1900 that burned through Whiskey Row.

Join historians Bradley G. Courtney and Drew Desmond as they round up tales of Prescott’s fascinating past.

Flagstaff's history is a real smorgasbord of quirky characters and events.

Flagstaff, Arizona, was originally settled in the 1870s as a railroad and lumber town on the southwestern edge of the Colorado Plateau, amid the ponderosa pines. Now most noted for its proximity to the Grand Canyon, the city offers a tantalizing combination of history and progress. Theodore Roosevelt, the Apollo astronauts, Walt Disney filmmakers, Navajo code talkers and Pluto-discoverer Clyde Tombaugh all feature in the area’s fascinating past. Join authors Kevin Schindler and Michael Kitt as they relate the trials and triumphs that have given this town its charm, from the tumultuous days of the Wild West to the fast-paced twentieth century.

After legendary sheriff Pat Ware was thrown from his horse on a very muddy Commerce Street, the Gainesville Daily Hesperian observed that he “had enough mud sticking to his wardrobe to start a land boom in the Panhandle.” The Hesperian had an eye for detail, down to the autumn leaf pen wiper Dr. Arthur Carroll Scott received as a wedding present and the raid on Fount Duston’s watermelon patch. Ron Melugin has pored over thousands of articles from the newspaper’s frontier era, piecing together advertisements for Botanic Blood Balm and a county clerk’s train robbing spree. It is an account of bygone Gainesville so vivid that modern readers can almost see, hear and even (in the case of the 1894 privy ordinance) smell it.

Accept an invitation to the boundary-pushing heritage of the Texas Plains, from the first American Thanksgiving feast in the 1500s to Amarillo’s iconic seventy-two-ounce steak challenge five hundred years later. Even the limitless horizons of the Panhandle couldn’t contain the notes of musical pioneers like Mac Davis, Bobby Keys and the Velvets. Take a dip in Lubbock’s oldest swimming hole or share a sip with Pinkie Roden, the benevolent bootlegger of West Texas. Keep an eye out for longballs from Justiceburg’s “Stormin’ Norman” Cash and stray bats in Doodlebug Line’s Clarity Tunnel. Join Chuck Lanehart as he tracks the long-standing traditions and unexpected twists of life on the Texas Plains.

Phoenix's Ahwatukee Foothills is a true trailblazing community, growing from open desert to a community of nearly ninety thousand in just a few decades.

From the first homesteaders and farmers to the modern visionaries and trailblazers who established homes and businesses, it is a very compelling story. Discover the mystery of the Lost Ranch, the reason for Elliot Road's misspelling, the battle over annexation and the origins of the Easter Parade. Local historian Marty Gibson recounts the challenges, struggles and successes in this collection of tales from the other side of the hill.