Fort Worth Stories is a collection of thirty-two bite-sized chapters of the city’s history. Did you know that the same day Fort Worth was mourning the death of beloved African American “Gooseneck Bill” McDonald, Dallas was experiencing a series of bombings in black neighborhoods? Or that Fort Worth almost got the largest statue to Robert E. Lee ever put up anywhere, sculpted by the same massive talent that created Mount Rushmore? Or that Fort Worth was once the candy-making capital of the Southwest and gave Hershey, Pennsylvania, a good run for its money as the sweet spot of the nation? A remarkable number of national figures have made a splash in Fort Worth, including Theodore Roosevelt while he was President; Vernon Castle, the Dance King; Dr. H.H. Holmes, America’s first serial killer; Harry Houdini, the escape artist; and Texas Guinan, star of the vaudeville stage and the big screen. Fort Worth Stories is illustrated with 50 photographs and drawings, many of them never before published. This collection of stories will appeal to all who appreciate the Cowtown city.

In 1848 the York and Gilmore families stopped their covered wagons north of the Trinity River near present-day Fort Worth. A century and a half later, the settlement they founded is North Fort Worth, with a colorful history centered around livestock, tourism, and family life. After the Civil War, life often revolved around massive cattle drives passing through North Fort Worth. Later, stockyards were built and the meat packing industry boomed, attracting thousands of people from around the world - Austria, Greece, Russia, Mexico, and Poland. North Fort Worth is now incorporated within the city of Fort Worth and continues to contribute a unique history and atmosphere essential to one of Texas' most diverse and fascinating cities.

Aware that some may see the title of this volume as an oxymoron, James Ward Lee argues in his "Argumentative Introduction" that for more than a century Fort Worth writers have written well about a city too often dismissed as a semi-rural cow town. Writers have celebrated its world of cattle and oil, to be sure, but many have seen other sides of Fort Worth--the country club set, the literati, the artists and artisans, the musicians, the intellectuals, and the whole minority sub-culture that has given a cosmopolitan tone to the Queen City of the Prairies. Fort Worth is in many ways the most typical of Texas cities--proud of its slogan of "Cowtown and Culture." People mingle as easily at the new Bass Hall, with its world-class visiting entertainers and the Van Cliburn Piano Competition, as they do at the White Elephant Saloon or the Cowtown Coliseum. They visit a museum complex unrivalled anywhere in the world for a city Fort Worth's size, and they attend the Southwest Exposition and Livestock Show. Lee and Judy Alter, both Fort Worth residents and well-known writers themselves, found passages in novels, short stories, and poetry that caught the city's atmosphere and odd bits of its history. And they found that some of the best writing done about Cowtown is journalistic rather than what is usually considered literary. There are articles by current and former members of the staff of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and one particularly poignant piece about the last day of the old Fort Worth Press. Literary Fort Worth is a literary smorgasbord, with something to appeal to almost any reader's taste. And literary? You bet!

Timothy Isaiah "Longhair Jim" Courtright operated on both sides of the law and became a legend in his lifetime and after his death. One of the most colorful characters from the wild and woolly days of Fort Worth's Hell's Half Acre, Courtright was at various times city marshal, deputy sheriff, deputy U.S. marshal, private detective, hired killer, and racketeer. Today, he is almost forgotten, either as a gunfighter or a lawman, except in Fort Worth. Little is known about Courtright's early life, though he apparently served in the Union army during the Civil War. But when he arrived in the West, Courtright seemed to attract trouble. He was involved in a shootout during the 1886 railroad strikes and was accused of murder in New Mexico. Deputies were sent to Fort Worth to escort him to New Mexico to stand trial. His escape from them, complete with guns hidden under a restaurant table, is one of Fort Worth's most colorful stories. Finally, he was killed in a shootout that he apparently provoked with gambler and gunman Luke Short. To this day nobody is sure what provoked that feud, but Courtright was honored with the longest funeral procession Fort Worth had ever seen. The myth of Courtright as legendary gunfighter was built in two previous biographies--one by a novelist and the other by a Franciscan priest. After exhaustive research into contemporary newspapers and other accounts and close study of the previous two books, historian Robert K. DeArment deconstructs the myth of Longhair Jim and reconstructs the gunfighter as a real human being, complex, flawed, often courageous, usually both honorable and dishonorable. This book is a must for all those interested in the legends of the West, its lawmen, and its outlaws.

A History of Fort Worth in Black & White fills a long-empty niche on the Fort Worth bookshelf: a scholarly history of the city's black community that starts at the beginning with Ripley Arnold and the early settlers, and comes down to today with our current battles over education, housing, and representation in city affairs. The book's sidebars on some noted and some not-so-noted African Americans make it appealing as a school text as well as a book for the general reader. Using a wealth of primary sources, Richard Selcer dispels several enduring myths, for instance the mistaken belief that Camp Bowie trained only white soldiers, and the spurious claim that Fort Worth managed to avoid the racial violence that plagued other American cities in the twentieth century. Selcer arrives at some surprisingly frank conclusions that will challenge current politically correct notions.

In Fort Worth, the past and present exist side by side and spirits walk among the living. Stay the night at Miss Molly's Hotel; the oldest bed-and-breakfast in the city boasts frequent eerie occurrences and unexplained sightings. Nearby, Cattlemen's Fort Worth Steak House features a special like no other, just watch out for flying liquor! From Bonnie and Clyde's old "haunts" to the once notorious Hell's Half Acre, Fort Worth is filled with historic spots rumored to play host to lingering ghosts and specters.

Quijana is a girl in pieces. One-half Guatemalan, one-half American: When Quijana's Guatemalan cousins move to town, her dad seems ashamed that she doesn't know more about her family's heritage. One-half crush, one-half buddy: When Quijana meets Zuri and Jayden, she knows she's found true friends. But she can't help the growing feelings she has for Jayden. One-half kid, one-half grown-up: Quijana spends her nights Skyping with her ailing grandma and trying to figure out what's going on with her increasingly hard-to-reach brother. In the course of this immersive and beautifully written novel, Quijana must figure out which parts of herself are most important, and which pieces come together to make her whole. This lyrical debut from Rebecca Balcárcel is a heartfelt poetic portrayal of a girl growing up, fitting in, and learning what it means to belong.