This text explores the natural history of Texas and more than 2900 springs in 183 Texas counties. It also includes an in-depth discussion of the general characteristics of springs - their physical and prehistoric settings, their historical significance, and their associated flora and fauna.

The Rio Grande makes a large bend into Mexico and forms the "boot heel" of Texas that is the Big Bend. Big Bend National Park nestles inside this meander, and its history is as much a part of Mexico as it is of Texas. The remote border location is historically replete with rich cultural diversity, including nomadic bands of Native Americans, Spanish explorers, Mexican and Anglo farmers, ranchers, miners, military men, and entrepreneurs. In the 1930s, a handful of people saw the Big Bend's majestic ruggedness as a place where all Americans could touch the Creator in nature and appreciate the alien qualities that both test and console the human spirit. This remote frontier still draws the souls of those seeking wide-open vistas and crystal-clear night skies.

For news junkies and fans of the bizarre-but-true, here is an outrageous collection of all-real, all-weird news stories culled from the nation's mainstream newspapers. Line art throughout.

Austin’s thriving film culture, renowned for international events such as SXSW and the Austin Film Festival, extends back to the early 1970s when students in the Department of Radio-Television-Film at the University of Texas at Austin ran a film programming unit that screened movies for students and the public. Dubbed CinemaTexas, the program offered viewers a wide variety of films—old and new, mainstream, classic, and cult—at a time when finding and watching films after their first run was very difficult and prohibitively expensive. For each film, RTF graduate students wrote program notes that included production details, a sampling of critical reactions, and an original essay that placed the film and its director within context and explained the movie’s historical significance. Over time, CinemaTexas Program Notes became more ambitious and were distributed around the world, including to luminaries such as film critic Pauline Kael. This anthology gathers a sampling of CinemaTexas Program Notes, organized into four sections: “USA Film History,” “Hollywood Auteurs,” “Cinema-Fist: Renegade Talents,” and “America’s Shadow Cinema.” Many of the note writers have become prominent film studies scholars, as well as leading figures in the film, TV, music, and video game industries. As a collection, CinemaTexas Notes strongly contradicts the notion of an effortlessly formed American film canon, showing instead how local film cultures—whether in Austin, New York, or Europe—have forwarded the development of film studies as a discipline.

Concerns have been raised about the Dept. of Education¿s role in overseeing the lenders & schools that participate in the largest of the Federal government¿s student loan programs, the Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP). The author was asked to analyze the Dept. of Education¿s use of its oversight, guidance, & enforcement authorities under FFELP. To do this, the author reviewed departmental documents & Federal laws, regulations, & cases & interviewed officials from the Dept. of Education & the student loan industry. Includes recommendations. Charts & tables.

The U.S. Supreme Court has recognized the individual right to keep and bear arms, but courts in states that have extreme gun control restrictions apply tests that balance the right away. This book demonstrates that the right peaceably to carry firearms is a fundamental right recognized by the text of the Second Amendment and is part of our American history and tradition. Halbrook’s scholarly work is an exhaustive historical treatment of the fundamental, individual right to carry firearms outside of the home. Halbrook traces this right from its origins in England through American colonial times, the American Revolution, the Constitution’s ratification debates, and then through the antebellum and post-bellum periods, including the history surrounding the enactment of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. This book is another important contribution by Halbrook to the scholarship concerning the text, history and tradition of the Second Amendment’s right to bear and carry arms.