In 1868, four treasure hunters from San Marcos, Texas, searched for a lost mine on the San Saba River, near today’s Menard. It was popularized as folklore in J. Frank Dobie’s treasure legend classic Coronado’s Children. One hundred and fifty years later, a descendant of one of those four men set out to discover the history behind the legend. This book recounts that search, from the founding of the ill-fated 1757 mission on the San Saba River up to the last attempt, in 1990, to find the treasure in this particular legend. It describes Jim Bowie, a fake treasure map industry, murder trials, a rattlesnake dancer, fortunes lost, a very long Texas cave, and surprising twists to the story popularized by Dobie. The book will not lead anyone to the legendary ten-thousand pounds of silver, but it will open a treasure trove of Texas history and the unique characters who hunted the fabulous riches.

The Texas Folklore Society has been publishing a regular volume of folklore research (our PTFS series) for the past several decades. Most of these books are what we call miscellanies, compilations of the works of multiple folklorists, and they feature articles on many types of lore. We've also published over twenty "Extra Books," which are single-author manuscripts that examine a more focused topic. Short Call: Snippets from the Smallest Places in Texas, 1935-2000 by Joyce Gibson Roach, is TFS Extra Book #24. Joyce Gibson Roach has collected “snippets” of stories, recipes, and traditions of life in Turtle, Texas, which represents many small towns—and the people who inhabit them. Many of the younger generations leave such towns, finding both place and society crumbling. Those who've stayed are finding new and interesting ways to put themselves and their places back together. Both the short and long pieces herein are about the folks who've elected to stay generation after generation, knowing that for them wherever they’ve stayed is still the Home Place. The characters' viewpoints are personal, sometimes agreeing with facts found in history books and sometimes not.

In TFS Extra Book #28, Beatrice Upshaw shares her memories of growing up in County Line. A Biscuit for Your Shoe captures the lore of a community which began as a freedom colony west of Nacogdoches in East Texas. The book is a memoir, but it shares more than merely family memories of significant events. It tells of beliefs, home remedies, folk games, and customs, as well as the importance of religion and education to a community of like-minded people. The narrative is a rich source of colloquial language and proverbial sayings that help define a group of people and their strong sense of place. Richard Orton was first introduced to County Line by F. E. “Ab” Abernethy, the Secretary-Editor of the TFS for nearly four decades. Richard eventually did a photographic book on the people of the community, The Upshaws of County Line: An American Family, but he believed that Beatrice’s memoir should be developed into a separate work that could be shared with an audience larger than just family and friends. Richard’s introduction explains the value of the stories Beatrice Upshaw presents in A Biscuit for Your Shoe; they are personal, but the overall narrative speaks collectively about …