Download or read book Cult of Glory written by Doug J. Swanson and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2021-06-08 with total page 481 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Swanson has done a crucial public service by exposing the barbarous side of the Rangers.” —The New York Times Book Review A twenty-first century reckoning with the legendary Texas Rangers that does justice to their heroic moments while also documenting atrocities, brutality, oppression, and corruption The Texas Rangers came to life in 1823, when Texas was still part of Mexico. Nearly 200 years later, the Rangers are still going--one of the most famous of all law enforcement agencies. In Cult of Glory, Doug J. Swanson has written a sweeping account of the Rangers that chronicles their epic, daring escapades while showing how the white and propertied power structures of Texas used them as enforcers, protectors and officially sanctioned killers. Cult of Glory begins with the Rangers' emergence as conquerors of the wild and violent Texas frontier. They fought the fierce Comanches, chased outlaws, and served in the U.S. Army during the Mexican War. As Texas developed, the Rangers were called upon to catch rustlers, tame oil boomtowns, and patrol the perilous Texas-Mexico border. In the 1930s they began their transformation into a professionally trained police force. Countless movies, television shows, and pulp novels have celebrated the Rangers as Wild West supermen. In many cases, they deserve their plaudits. But often the truth has been obliterated. Swanson demonstrates how the Rangers and their supporters have operated a propaganda machine that turned agency disasters and misdeeds into fables of triumph, transformed murderous rampages--including the killing of scores of Mexican civilians--into valorous feats, and elevated scoundrels to sainthood. Cult of Glory sets the record straight. Beginning with the Texas Indian wars, Cult of Glory embraces the great, majestic arc of Lone Star history. It tells of border battles, range disputes, gunslingers, massacres, slavery, political intrigue, race riots, labor strife, and the dangerous lure of celebrity. And it reveals how legends of the American West--the real and the false--are truly made.

Download or read book Texas an Illustrated History written by David G. McComb and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1995 with total page 142 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The long and complex history of Texas, brimming with facts, anecdotes, tall tales, and trivia as well as fascinating photographs and illustrations from the past and present. Prominent Texans also profiled.

Download or read book Texas Rangers written by Michael P. Spradlin and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2008-03-01 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An action-packed picture book brings to life the colorful history of the legendary lawmen who fought in the Revolutionary War, defended the Alamo, and crossed enemy lines, by tracing their very first skirmish to their role in modern-day Texas.

Download or read book Terry s Texas Rangers written by Bryan S. Bush and published by Turner. This book was released on 2002 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Turner Publishing Company is pleased to announce the release of Terry's Texas Rangers -- The 8th Texas Cavalry by author Bryan S. Bush. An amazing unit! They participated in more than three hundred engagements during their career, fighting in more battles than any other cavalry regiment, North or South. Bush takes you on a journey through out the South from 1861-1865. Much of the story is taken from these cavalry men's own words and eyewitness accounts never before available to readers.

Download or read book Seasons in Hell written by Mike Shropshire and published by Diversion Books. This book was released on 2014-03-25 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A funny, revealing, Ball Four–like romp through mid-seventies baseball” from the longtime sports columnist and author of The Last Real Season (Booklist). You think your team is bad? In this “disastrously hilarious” work on one of the most tortured franchises in baseball, one reporter discovers that nine innings can feel like an eternity (USA Today). In early 1973, gonzo sportswriter Mike Shropshire agreed to cover the Texas Rangers for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, not realizing that the Rangers were arguably the worst team in baseball history. Seasons in Hell is a riotous, candid, irreverent behind-the-scenes account in the tradition of The Bronx Zoo and Ball Four, following the Texas Rangers from Whitey Herzog’s reign in 1973 through Billy Martin’s tumultuous tenure. Offering wonderful perspectives on dozens of unique (and likely never-to-be-seen-again) baseball personalities, Seasons in Hell recounts some of the most extreme characters ever to play the game and brings to life the no-holds-barred culture of major league baseball in the mid-seventies. “The single funniest sports book I have ever read.”—Don Imus “The locker-room shenanigans of a lousy team of the 1970s.”—Publishers Weekly

Download or read book None But Texians written by Jeffrey D. Murrah and published by . This book was released on 2001 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: None But Texians: presents the accomplishments and struggles of Terry's Texas Rangers as they fought through hundreds of engagements across seven states. This history covers the weapons the Rangers carried, flags they fought under, clothes they wore, songs they sang, and what became of many of them after the war.

Download or read book Texas Rangers written by Stephen Hardin and published by Osprey Publishing. This book was released on 2000-02-15 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 19th century Rangers protected their neighbours from Indian attack, fought and died in a war for freedom, and staved off foreign invasion. Their later adversaries included hardened criminals such as John Wesley Hardin and Bonnie and Clyde. Today the Rangers are a modern organisation and represent the elite of Texas law enforcement.

Download or read book Yours to Command written by Harold J. Weiss (Jr.) and published by University of North Texas Press. This book was released on 2009 with total page 481 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Captain Bill McDonald's (1852-1918) admirers rank him as one of the great captains of Texas Ranger history. His detractors see him as an irresponsible lawman who precipitated violence, hungered for publicity, and related tall tales that cast himself in the hero's role. This title seeks to find the true Bill McDonald and sort fact from myth.

Download or read book One Ranger written by H. Joaquin Jackson and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2011-08-29 with total page 435 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A retired Texas Ranger recalls a career that took him from shootouts in South Texas to film sets in Hollywood. When his picture appeared on the cover of Texas Monthly, Joaquin Jackson became the icon of the modern Texas Rangers. Nick Nolte modeled his character in the movie Extreme Prejudice on him. Jackson even had a speaking part of his own in The Good Old Boys with Tommy Lee Jones. But the role that Jackson has always played the best is that of the man who wears the silver badge cut from a Mexican cinco peso coin, a working Texas Ranger. Legend says that one Ranger is all it takes to put down lawlessness and restore the peace: one riot, one Ranger. In this adventure-filled memoir, Joaquin Jackson recalls what it was like to be the Ranger who responded when riots threatened, violence erupted, and criminals needed to be brought to justice across a wide swath of the Texas-Mexico border from 1966 to 1993. Jackson has dramatic stories to tell. Defying all stereotypes, he was the one Ranger who ensured a fair election—and an overwhelming win for La Raza Unida party candidates—in Zavala County in 1972. He followed legendary Ranger Captain Alfred Y. Allee Sr. into a shootout at the Carrizo Springs jail that ended a prison revolt and left him with nightmares. He captured “The See More Kid,” an elusive horse thief and burglar who left clean dishes and swept floors in the houses he robbed. He investigated the 1988 shootings in Big Bend’s Colorado Canyon and tried to understand the motives of the Mexican teenagers who terrorized three river rafters and killed one. He even helped train Afghan mujahedin warriors to fight the Soviet Union. Jackson’s tenure in the Texas Rangers began when older Rangers still believed that law need not get in the way of maintaining order, and concluded as younger Rangers were turning to computer technology to help solve crimes. Though he insists, “I am only one Ranger. There was only one story that belonged to me,” his story is part of the larger story of the Texas Rangers becoming a modern law enforcement agency that serves all the people of the state. It’s a story that’s as interesting as any of the legends. And yet, Jackson’s story confirms the legends, too. With just over a hundred Texas Rangers to cover a state with 267,399 square miles, any one may become the one Ranger who, like Joaquin Jackson in Zavala County in 1972, stops one riot. “A powerful, moving read . . . One Ranger is as fascinating as the memoirs of nineteenth-century Rangers James Gillett and George Durham, and the histories by Frederick Wilkins and Walter Prescott Webb—and equally as important.” —True West “A straight-shooting book that blow[s] a few holes in the Ranger myth while providing more ammunition for the myth’s continuation. . . . Reads more like a novel than [an] autobiography.” —Austin American-Statesman

Download or read book Texas Ranger Biographies written by Charles Houston Harris and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The biographies of all 1,782 Texas Rangers who served during the era of the Mexican Revolution are collected in one volume for the first time.

Download or read book The Texas Rangers written by Walter Prescott Webb and published by Univ of TX + ORM. This book was released on 2010-07-22 with total page 1110 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The renowned historian’s classic study of the Texas Ranger Division, presented with its original illustrations and a foreword by Lyndon B. Johnson. Texas Rangers tells the story of this unique law enforcement agency from its origin in 1823, when it was formed by “Father of Texas” Stephen F. Austin, to the 1930s, when legendary lawman Frank Hamer tracked down the infamous outlaws Bonnie and Clyde. Both colorful and authoritative, it presents the evolution and exploits of the Texas Rangers through Comanche raids, the Mexican War, annexation, secession, and on into the 20th century. Written in 1935 by Walter Prescott Webb, the pioneering historian of the American West, Texas Rangers is a true classic of Texas history.

Download or read book Riding Lucifer s Line written by Bob Alexander and published by University of North Texas Press. This book was released on 2013 with total page 431 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Texas-Mexico border is trouble. Haphazardly splashing across the meandering Rio Grande into Mexico is--or at least can be--risky business, hazardous to one's health and well-being. Kirby W. Dendy, the Chief of Texas Rangers, corroborates the sobering reality: "As their predecessors for over one hundred forty years before them did, today's Texas Rangers continue to battle violence and transnational criminals along the Texas-Mexico border." In Riding Lucifer's Line, Bob Alexander, in his characteristic storytelling style, surveys the personal tragedies of twenty-five Texas Rangers who made the ultimate sacrifice as they scouted and enforced laws throughout borderland counties adjacent to the Rio Grande. The timeframe commences in 1874 with formation of the Frontier Battalion, which is when the Texas Rangers were actually institutionalized as a law enforcing entity, and concludes with the last known Texas Ranger death along the border in 1921. Alexander also discusses the transition of the Rangers in two introductory sections: "The Frontier Battalion Era, 1874-1901" and "The Ranger Force Era, 1901-1935," wherein he follows Texas Rangers moving from an epochal narrative of the Old West to more modern, technological times. Written absent a preprogrammed agenda, Riding Lucifer's Line is legitimate history. Adhering to facts, the author is not hesitant to challenge and shatter stale Texas Ranger mythology. Likewise, Alexander confronts head-on many of those critical Texas Ranger histories relying on innuendo and gossip and anecdotal accounts, at the expense of sustainable evidence--writings often plagued with a deficiency of rational thinking and common sense. Riding Lucifer's Line is illustrated with sixty remarkable old-time photographs. Relying heavily on archived Texas Ranger documents, the lively text is authenticated with more than one thousand comprehensive endnotes.

Download or read book One Ranger Returns written by H. Joaquin Jackson and published by Univ of TX + ORM. This book was released on 2010-01-01 with total page 318 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A retired Texas lawman shares stories of serial killers, labor strikes, and more, in this sequel to the runaway bestselling memoir One Ranger. No Texas Ranger memoir has captured the public’s imagination like Joaquin Jackson’s One Ranger. Readers thrilled to Jackson’s stories of catching criminals and keeping the peace across a wide swath of the Texas-Mexico border and clamored for more. Now in One Ranger Returns, Jackson reopens his case files to tell more unforgettable stories, while also giving readers a deeply personal view of what being a Texas Ranger has meant to him and his family. Jackson recalls his five-year pursuit of two of America’s most notorious serial killers: Henry Lee Lucas and Ottis Toole. He sets the record straight about the role of the Texas Rangers during the United Farm Workers strike in the Rio Grande Valley in 1966–1967. Jackson also describes the frustration of trying to solve a cold case from 1938, the brutal murder of a mother and daughter in the lonely desert east of Van Horn. He presents a rogue’s gallery of cattle rustlers, drug smugglers, and a teetotaling bootlegger named Tom Bybee, a modest, likeable man who became an ax murderer. And in an eloquent concluding chapter, Jackson pays tribute to the Rangers who have gone before him, as well as those who keep the peace today. “To the good fortune of us all, Jackson is back again, this time with One Ranger Returns. Packed full of compelling accounts of his dealings with smugglers, thieves, murderers, and other lawmen, this long-anticipated sequel promises to rival the original. This man is a true American hero. Don’t miss reading about his adventures.” —Cowboy Magazine

Download or read book Rodriguez Texas Ranger written by Rick Harper and published by iUniverse. This book was released on 2013-12 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As a young man, Arturo Rodriguez was always the guardian of the underdog. This theme carried through to his adult life when he became the first Mexican-American Texas Ranger, an intense and dramatic event in South Texas history. In Rodriguez... Texas Ranger! author Rick Harper recounts Rodriguez's life and law enforcement career. As Harper tells Rodriguez's story, he also chronicles many of Texas and Mexico's significant historical events and their corresponding sociocultural, economic, and racial developmental patterns to demonstrate not only their immediate impact, but also the ways in which these events and patterns framed the region's present state. Providing insight into the dynamic nature of Texas during the 1960s and '70s, Rodriguez... Texas Ranger! tells a tale of Gringos and Chicanos, justice and vengeance, the law and the lawless, pistoleros and politics, sharpshooters and shopkeepers, ranchers and farmers, cowboys and cattle drives, governors and goat headers, and Texas Rangers. It's about the passing of a frontier system and the emergence of modern times.

Download or read book The Texas Rangers written by Chuck Parsons and published by Arcadia Publishing. This book was released on 2011 with total page 132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Texas Rangers. The words evoke exciting images of daring, courage, high adventure. The Rangers began as a handful of men protecting their homes from savage raiding parties; now in their third century of existence, they are a highly sophisticated crime-fighting organization. Yet at times even today the Texas Ranger mounts his horse to track fugitives through dense chaparral, depending on his wits more than technology. The iconic image of the Texas Ranger is of a man who is tall, unflinching, and dedicated to doing a difficult job no matter what the odds. The Rangers of the 21st century are different sizes, colors, and genders, but remain as vital and real today as when they were created in the horseback days of 1823, when what is today Texas was part of Mexico, a wild and untamed land.

Download or read book Texas Ranger written by John Boessenecker and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2016-04-26 with total page 496 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The New York Times bestseller! “Frank Hamer, last of the old breed of Texas Rangers, has not fared well in history or popular culture. John Boessenecker now restores this incredible Ranger to his proper place alongside such fabled lawmen as Wyatt Earp and Eliot Ness. Here is a grand adventure story, told with grace and authority by a master historian of American law enforcement. Frank Hamer can rest easy as readers will finally learn the truth behind his amazing career, spanning the end of the Wild West through the bloody days of the gangsters.” --Paul Andrew Hutton, author of The Apache Wars To most Americans, Frank Hamer is known only as the “villain” of the 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde. Now, in Texas Ranger, historian John Boessenecker sets out to restore Hamer’s good name and prove that he was, in fact, a classic American hero. From the horseback days of the Old West through the gangster days of the 1930s, Hamer stood on the front lines of some of the most important and exciting periods in American history. He participated in the Bandit War of 1915, survived the climactic gunfight in the last blood feud of the Old West, battled the Mexican Revolution’s spillover across the border, protected African Americans from lynch mobs and the Ku Klux Klan, and ran down gangsters, bootleggers, and Communists. When at last his career came to an end, it was only when he ran up against another legendary Texan: Lyndon B. Johnson. Written by one of the most acclaimed historians of the Old West, Texas Ranger is the first biography to tell the full story of this near-mythic lawman.

Download or read book Texas written by Archie P. McDonald and published by TX A&m-McWhiney Foundation. This book was released on 2007 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Texas "a whole other country"-a slogan that promotes tourism as much within the Lone Star State as elsewhere-is familiar to native Texans and those adopted sons and daughters who "got here just as quickly as they could." Texas is as varied as East Texas timberland, hundreds of miles of seashore, prairies of the Central and High Plains, and the dry desert of far West Texas. When traveling abroad and asked, "Where are you from?" residents of forty-nine of the United States usually respond, "the USA." Nearly every citizen of the Lone Star State will answer "Texas!" The world encourages such chauvinism. Mass media celebrates and exploits Texas and Texans in television and motion pictures about the Alamo, Texas Rangers, the oil industry, and athletics, to name only a few genre. Texans' pride in their distinctiveness increases when their state is paraded-or satired-and they consciously "pass it on" to succeeding generations. But what does it mean to be a Texan? How did Texas come to be as it is? Texas: A Compact History provides answers to such questions about Texans and Texas. It tells the story of Texas history and provides thoughtful interpretations about the state's development, all with the general reader in mind-in a brief, easily read narrative. ARCHIE P. McDONALD is the author of numerous books dealing with various aspects of Texas history, including Back Then: Simple Pleasures and Everyday Heroes (State House Press, 2005)