Texas singer/songwriter Vince Bell’s story begins in the 1970s. Following the likes of Townes Van Zandt and Guy Clark, Bell and his contemporaries Lyle Lovett, Nanci Griffith, and Lucinda Williams were on the rise. In December of 1982, Bell was on his way home from the studio (where he and hired guns Stevie Ray Vaughan and Eric Johnson had just recorded three of Bell’s songs) when a drunk driver broadsided him at 65 mph. Thrown over 60 feet from his car, Bell suffered multiple lacerations to his liver, embedded glass, broken ribs, a mangled right forearm, and a severe traumatic brain injury. Not only was his debut album waylaid for a dozen years, life as he’d known it would never be the same. In detailing his recovery from the accident and his roundabout climb back onstage, Bell shines a light in those dark corners of the music business that, for the lone musician whose success is measured not by the Top 40 but by nightly victories, usually fall outside of the spotlight. Bell’s prose is not unlike his lyrics: spare, beautiful, evocative, and often sneak-up-on-you funny. His chronicle of his own life and near death on the road reveals what …

Spare yet evocative, the poems in Mister Martini pair explorations of a father-son relationship with haiku-like martini recipes. The martini becomes a daring metaphor for this relationship as it moves from the son’s childhood to the father’s death. Each poem is a strong drink in its own right, and together they form a potent narrative of alienation and love between a father and son struggling to communicate. “This is a truly original book. There’s nothing extra: sharp and clear and astonishing. Viva!” —Naomi Shihab Nye, judge and author of 19 Varieties of Gazelle

Interview with Margaret Hunt Davis, alumna of North Texas State University. The interview includes Davis' personal experiences about childhood in rural East Texas, making the decision to attend North Texas, campus life, graduating with a degree in library science, and having a career in Dallas public schools.

James M. Davis is a retired businessman who lives in Midland, Texas, with his wife of over six decades, Jean. He served on active duty in the U.S. Army Air Forces for more than two and a half years during World War II, and then in the Air Force reserves until 1961. David L. Snead, the editor, is an associate professor of history at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia. He received his Ph.D. in history from the University of Virginia and is the author of The Gaither Committee, Eisenhower, and the Cold War and George E. Browne: An American Doughboy in World War I.

Interview with Carl Denmon, African-American alumnus of North Texas State University. The interview includes Denmon's personal experiences about childhood in Houston, Texas and undergraduate education at Wiley College. Additionally, Denmon discusses his employment as band director at Fred Moore High School in Denton, graduate studies in Music and Education at NTSU, his career with and retirement from Dallas County Community College, and his perceptions of changes in Denton and at North Texas over forty years.

Interview with Murphy Daniels, African-American alumnus of North Texas State University. The interview includes Daniels' personal experiences about childhood and education, enrolling in North Texas rather than Texas Southern University, majoring in pre-med, serving in the United States Air Force, studying at Southwestern Medical School, and pursuing medical research. Additionally, Daniels speaks about his difficulties with white professors and graduate assistants, race relations on campus, social life among black students on campus, and off-campus life in "Shack Town" and the support from black citizens of Denton.

Interview with Abe C. Cooper, African-American alumnus of North Texas State University. The interview includes Cooper's personal experiences about childhood and early adulthood in Dallas, Texas, attending all-black schools, and enrolling at North Texas State College in 1958. Cooper speaks about the adjustments required for attending school in an integrated setting, boarding with African-American families in the "Shack Town" neighborhood of Denton, and the comparative experiences with students and faculty in the Schools of Engineering and Education.

In the early 1870s, Hubert H. Bancroft and his assistants set out to record the memoirs of early Californios, one of them being eighty-three-year-old Don José María Amador, a former “Forty-Niner” during the California Gold Rush and soldado de cuera at the Presidio of San Francisco. Amador tells of reconnoitering expeditions into the interior of California, where he encountered local indigenous populations. He speaks of political events of Mexican California and the widespread confiscation of the Californios’ goods, livestock, and properties when the United States took control. A friend from Mission Santa Cruz, Lorenzo Asisara, also describes the harsh life and mistreatment the Indians faced from the priests. Both the Amador and Asisara narratives were used as sources in Bancroft’s writing but never published themselves. Gregorio Mora-Torres has now rescued them from obscurity and presents their voices in English translation (with annotations) and in the original Spanish on facing pages. This bilingual edition will be of great interest to historians of the West, California, and Mexican American studies. “This book presents a very convincing and interesting narrative about Mexican California. Its frankness and honesty are refreshing.”–Richard Griswold del Castillo, San Diego State University

Interview with community activist Gloria Villanueva-Anderson. The interview includes Villanueva-Anderson's personal experiences about being an activist in the Mexican-American community of Denton, Texas, education in Denton schools, discrimination at the train station in Denison, Texas, being accepted to the work-scholarship program of the FBI in 1952, opening her telephone answering exchange business, turning toward Republican politics, and her activities with George H.W. Bush's Texas Statewide Hispanic Campaign. Additionally, Villanueva-Anderson discusses her family background, the lack of discrimination against Hispanics in Denton, her family's assimilation in the Anglo culture, early Hispanic families in Denton, her appointment to the North Texas Hispanic Advisory Board by Senator John Tower, as well as her appointments to the Texas Small Business Task Force by Governor William Clements, the White House Conference on Small Business by President Jimmy Carter, and as Regional Advocate for the Small Business Administration by Ronald Reagan.

What happens when an expert on grief is faced with the slow decline of her beloved mother? Like A Grief Observed by C. S. Lewis, Singing Mother Home offers an inside look at the struggles of an “expert” in coping with loss. Donna S. Davenport was forced to rethink the traditional academic approach to the process, which implied that the goal of grief resolution was to end the attachment to the loved one. Instead, she embarked on a personal exploration of her own anticipatory grief. This intimate narrative forms the core of her book. It is emotionally wrenching, but it also provides hope for those going through similar experiences. Just as Davenport used her family's tradition of singing to comfort her mother, readers will be encouraged to find their own sources of comfort in family and legacy. The book concludes by describing psychological approaches to grief and recommending further reading. “This is a unique book by a professional who understands the field of loss and grief. . . . Poignantly heartbreaking.”--Melba Vasquez, President, American Psychology Association's Division on Counseling Psychology

Transcript of an interview with Robert E. Yerger, a Navy veteran, concerning his experiences as a flying boat pilot in the Pacific Theater during World War II. Yerger discusses his decision to enlist in the Navy, May, 1942; basic flight training, Naval Air Station, Grand Prairie, Texas, 1942; advanced flight training, Naval Air Station, Corpus Christi, Texas, 1942; PBY flying boat training at Corpus Christi, 1942-43; his tenure as a flight instructor, Chase Field, Beeville, Texas, 1943; assignment as a base personnel officer at Chase Field, 1943-45; flying PB2Y flying boats with cargo and personnel in the Pacific, 1945; activities on Majuro Island; his experience flying the Martin Mars flying boat; mustering out of the service, August, 1946.

Interview with Navy veteran Frank Curre Jr. The interview includes Curre's personal experiences about joining the Navy, boot camp, being aboard the battleship USS Tennessee during the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor, and his subsequent experiences in the Pacific Theater during World War II. Additionally, Curre talks about pre-war shipboard life and training exercises, his activities during the attack on Pearl Harbor, aftermath of the attack, his transfer to the yard minesweeper YMS-102 at Bremerton, Washington, operation around Midway Island, his transfer to the escort carrier Petrof Bay, the Battle of Leyte Gulf, kamikaze attacks, the Okinawa campaign, and continued combat against kamikazes.