Innholdsfortegnelse for August 2023 i Texas Highways Magazine

Since we debuted our Open Road essay in the November 2018 issue, we’ve had the great fortune to feature some of the state’s brightest literary minds. Kicked off with a spirited piece by beloved Austin author Sarah Bird about her writing fellowship at J. Frank Dobie’s Paisano Ranch, the Open Road section hasn’t had a repeat writer in its nearly five-year run. This month’s essay, the 57th in the series, is penned by poet, essayist, and University of Texas associate professor Roger Reeves. Though originally from New Jersey, the National Book Award finalist now based in Austin is indicative of the deep talent reflected in today’s Texas literary landscape. About a year ago, novelist and editor S. Kirk Walsh reached out to us about the possibility of publishing fiction in…

From her first sentence, I was there. I could feel the icy cold spring-fed water. Please pass this on to Kimberly and tell her how much I appreciate her writing style and her willingness to share her experience. Steven Culpepper Williams, Garland On the Creek No trip to Salado is complete without visiting Barrow Brewing Company [“Humble Beginnings,” June]. Try any of their craft beers and the barbecue. Case McDole Gulf Coast Lighthouses Most were torn down or destroyed by natural causes [“Guiding Light,” June]. The idea of preserving these didn’t happen until it was too late for most. Deronda C. Lane Longhorn Cavern I remember going there when I was 4 or 5 years old [“Out From Under,” May]. They told us we needed to be quiet because it…

If not for the lone blinking yellow traffic light on US 90 just northwest of Del Rio, it’d be easy to miss the dusty little town of Comstock. The area is home to the oldest rock art in North America, making archeologists a majority of the population. The many limestone canyons that branch off from the Pecos and Rio Grande rivers conceal rock shelters with pictographs more than 6,000 years old. Seminole Canyon State Park and Historic Site is Comstock’s best-known rock art destination, but there are over 325 documented sites nearby. History enthusiasts will enjoy touring them, but anyone can appreciate the area’s natural beauty and rugged charm. Gas up before heading further west to other towns like Langtry—the home of legendary lawman Judge Roy Bean—as there aren’t any…

At first glance, Comfort Café in San Antonio looks like a typical brunch joint. There are plates filled with eggs and bacon, half-inch-thick pancakes, and a two-hour wait on Saturday mornings. But the menu doesn’t feature a trendy mimosa flight or list any prices for dishes. The most notable difference: A busser or server might stop for a moment to talk openly about their recovery from addiction. Comfort Café is a pay-what-you-want (or what-you-can) restaurant with locations in Smithville and San Antonio. The cafés are run by SerenityStar, a recovery center founded by couple Teri and Rosie Lopez. All proceeds from its weekend brunches support the center, and everyone who works at the cafés is in recovery from addiction or alcoholism. “The anonymity that goes on in 12-step rooms, we…

FREE EVENTS GUIDE Want even more events delivered to your mailbox? Get a free subscription to the quarterly Texas Highways Events Calendar at texashighways.com/eventsubscription Canoers and kayakers traverse the meandering Neches River in Palestine, ducking fallen trees and dodging stumps along the way. An annual tradition in East Texas, the Neches River Wilderness Race covers 22 miles of flatwater racing along a waterway teeming with natural beauty and natural obstacles alike. Since 1990, two classes of paddlers—leisure and pro—have zipped through the river in the “toughest little race in Texas.” It’s a nod to the annual Texas Water Safari, which is called the “world’s toughest canoe race” and runs from San Marcos to the Gulf Coast. Size notwith-standing, the Neches River Wilderness Race promises to challenge contestants as they navigate…

Begin Again CIRCA 1890 Photographer M.C. Ragsdale, who took this photo of San Angelo with the newly built Tom Green County Courthouse in the background, found his photography business taking off in tandem with the nascent town. Born in 1849, Ragsdale moved from his native South Carolina to Texas after the Civil War. He bought a camera in 1870 and became an itinerant photographer whose circuit included Menard, Belton, Brownwood, and Fort McKavitt. In 1882, Ragsdale moved permanently to San Angelo and opened a photography business. It was a momentous time: In August of that year, a devastating flood in Ben Ficklin, the county seat at the time, killed 65 citizens and necessitated the county seat’s move to San Angelo. The town flourished and so did Ragsdale’s business—he operated it…

London-based illustrator James Weston Lewis has never been to Texas, but he was excited to display his impression of our great state for “Fault Lines” (Page 50), a collection of six short fiction stories from Texas authors. “My perceptions mostly come from film and television,” he says. To find a through-line in the tales of small town Texas, Lewis focuses on quiet moments of observation, either from the characters or the writers. “It was really nice to engage with these smaller-scale stories across individual locations that I haven’t seen depicted before,” Lewis says. “All of the stories had quite a meditative aspect to them.”…

Let There Be Light Marshall’s landscape has included religious institutions since 1841, when founder Peter Whetstone provided property to build a courthouse, a school, and a church to secure the county seat. A few years later, John Bryce and Rev. George Washington Baines, President Lyndon B. Johnson’s great-grandfather, founded the town’s First Baptist Church. Photographer Dave Shafer captured the church for “Small Towns to Visit Now” (Page 30), but shooting it at sunset came with difficulties. “It may not seem like it, but when the sun is setting, it really moves fast, much faster than you think and want,” Shafer says. He chose a silhouette for a more abstract image. “I wanted to give the viewer a pleasant visual without too much extraneous detail,” he says.…

ELLIS COUNTY HISTORIC COURTHOUSE 101 W. Main St., Waxahachie. 972-825-5000; co.ellis.tx.us Tours are available to the public Mon-Fri 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Rona Hedges and Pam Poovey step out of Eubank Florist & Gifts, where they work, and light cigarettes before taking part in some good old-fashioned rubber-necking. Across the street, in the middle of Waxahachie’s historic square, commotion surrounds the Ellis County Historic Courthouse. Large lights on a crane, trucks with equipment, and dozens of people surround the structure. Completed in 1897 with nine stories of red limestone, pink granite, and red sandstone, the courthouse is used to being the main character in town, but on this early morning in February, it’s relegated to a background scene-setter. Waxahachie is in the midst of getting the Taylor Sheridan treatment. The Texas…

IF YOU SNEEZE HARD ENOUGH, you might just blow right past the small North Texas town of Strawn. “That’s what I always tell people,” says Cody Doyle, whose family has lived in and around the community for the past few decades. He’s talking while waiting tables at Mary’s Cafe, a small stone facade building known for its legendary chicken-fried steak. Opened in 1986 by owner Mary Stretter, it’s the only restaurant in town, unless you count the Greyhound Pac-and-Sac, a convenience store where locals occasionally hang out and grill burgers out back. Mary’s has long welcomed hungry travelers visiting nearby Possum Kingdom Lake, and the oversize chicken-fried steak has been the town’s main claim to fame. That is, until now. Strawn, incorporated in 1940, began serving as a set location for…

OCELOTS, COWBOYS, AND conjunto music take center stage in Los Fresnos, one of the fastest-growing small towns in the Rio Grande Valley. While Texans might be more familiar with the town as the spot where traffic backs up on the way to South Padre Island, Los Fresnos rewards the curious traveler with the best of the RGV. Though Los Fresnos proper—about 4.1 square miles—wasn’t established until 1915, the town has been a farming community for much longer. Like most of the RGV, the land was cleared for ranching; the Valley has lost more than 90% of its natural habitat to clearance. But Los Fresnos is just a 30-minute drive to the Laguna Atascosa Wildlife Refuge. Established in 1946, the refuge protects nearly 11,000 acres of natural habitat. With more than 1,000…

IN PIERRE MENARD, TEXAS, it’s been rumored, the last battle of the Civil War is still being fought. My guide, who we’ll call Pedro, picks me up from the downtown San Antonio Greyhound station on aWednesday morning and informs me I’m to be the first reporter to have complete access to Pierre Menard—its soldiers, generals, and financiers—in at least six years. When I correct him that I’m not a reporter, he swats my words away, as if I’m joking. “You know what I mean,” he says. Pedro is an avid reader of mass-market science fiction and fantasy paperbacks, and most of the way there we talk about the decades-long sagas and tribulations of medieval rats. After about an hour on Interstate 10, we exit off an unmarked road past abandoned…

FREE TRAVEL INFO 1 Addison, Texas2 Big Spring Convention & Visitors Bureau3 Blanco Chamber of Commerce & Tourism Bureau4 Brady/McCulloch County Visitors Center5 Brazosport Convention & Visitors Council6 Bullock Texas State History Museum7 Cedar Park Tourism8 City of Harlingen Convention & Visitors Bureau9 City of Huntsville10 City of Portland11 City of Wimberley12 Clute Visitors Bureau13 Corsicana Convention & Visitors Center14 Destination Bryan15 Discover San Angelo16 Dumas Moore County Chamber of Commerce17 Fort Worth Zoo18 Galveston Island Section19 Glen Rose Somervell County Convention & Visitors Bureau20 Go Round Rock21 Graham Convention & Visitors Bureau22 Irving Arts Center23 Irving Convention & Visitors Bureau24 Kerrville Convention & Visitors Bureau25 Laredo Convention & Visitors Bureau26 LBJ Library and Museum27 Lewisville Convention & Visitors Bureau28 Lockhart Chamber of Commerce29 Mesquite Convention & Visitors Bureau30 Mineral Wells…

BEFORE YOU EVEN STEP FOOT IN ALBERT’S dance hall, you’ll hear live music emanating from the 100-year-old tin-covered building. The space is surrounded by acres of farmland and comes alive nightlywith country music—whether it’s a pickers’ circle of local musicians or a live show from the likes of progressive country singer Gary P. Nunn. Couples and families two-step on the dance floor and then grab a drink from the icehouse next door or a burger from the on-site Cowboy Cantina food truck. In the backyard, folks hang out under the 600-year-old majestic oak tree. Michael Miller, general manager of The Albert Dancehall & Icehouse, says most of his weekday clientele are regulars from nearby towns like Stonewall, Blanco, Fredericksburg, and Johnson City. On weekends, though, tourists visiting nearby wineries or escaping…

LIKE MOST FOLKS WHO STUMBLE upon Alpine, Chris and Ellen Ruggia were en route to Big Bend National Park. It was the early 1990s, and the population wasn’t much smaller than it is today. After the couple graduated from UT Austin, Ellen enrolled at Sul Ross State University in Alpine to study biology, while Chris took a job at a local print shop. “That’s what brought us here,” Chris says, “but it’s the community that kept us here.” Both the Ruggias are artists, and Chris is a musician in a band called The Swifts. These days he also serves as the city’s director of tourism. The duo are part of a thriving cultural scene, made up of musicians, artists, makers, and foodies. Though Alpine doesn’t get the same hype as Marfa,…

MY PHONE BUZZES AND IT’S MISSY saying, “I’m here, don’t you see me?” She’s there through the plate glass, right where I’ve been staring. I thought she was just some lady. She’s standing next to her maroon minivan waving at me. She wouldn’t let me take a cab. “Pampa isn’t a cab town,” she’d said. “Or don’t you remember?” “A car service then,” I’d countered. “Nobody does that out here. Let me greet you! You deserve a greeting. Also,” she added, “the bus station has gotten a little stabby. Junky. Probably safe in the daytime, but if somebody guts you it will really annoy me.” She’s wrong—it’s not stabby here at all, not junky. Just empty, windblown charm. The same tiny town I remember. At Missy’s van we hug, and…

Despite Round Top’s tiny population of 93 residents, it’s become an oasis for antique lovers across the country. Located about 80 miles outside of Austin, the quaint town is home to the renowned Round Top Antiques Fair, which caters to those looking to treasure hunt for rare relics and fanciful finds. Twice a year for a week in the spring and fall, a swarm of shoppers descend upon Round Top needing dining options to keep them fueled for the task at hand. Thankfully, visitors can experience some of the tastiest fare in the state at Royers Round Top Cafe on Main Street. Helmed by married couple JB and Jamie Royer, the town’s mainstay café offers a welcoming atmosphere that combines the familiar feel of a dive bar with the reliable…

It is entirely possible Adrian Quesada is the most talented and inspired musician, producer, and songwriter Austin has seen in 20 years. Maybe since Stevie Ray Vaughan. Let’s run the numbers: Since 1997, the 46-year-old Laredo native has been a participant, on some level, in 51 recordings. It all started with his avantgarde jazz act the Blue Noise Band, which fused with fellow travelers the Blimp in 2000 to form the brilliant, Grammy-winning Grupo Fantasma. This Latin funk crew became known nationally for occasionally playing live shows with Prince. He did time with Grupo spinoffs Brownout and Money Chicha, the pan-Latin outfit Ocote Soul Sounds, the indie rock trio Spanish Gold, the psych act Echocentrics, and the trippy duo the Electric Peanut Butter Company. But wait, there’s more. Quesada released…