exas General Land Office Commissioner Jerry Patterson has responded to the National Park Service’s proposal to acquire the Christmas Mountains in Brewster County. His answer: No guns, no deal: create a National Preserve and we can talk. by John Waters    more »

On a stunningly clear mid-January afternoon Texas General Land Office Commissioner Jerry Patterson pilots his 90-horsepower Citabria aircraft from San Marcos to land at Terlingua Ranch’s 4,000-foot dirt runway, at 1:30 pm. On board with Patterson is a chilled Sam Gwynne, writer from Texas Monthly, who has endured the three-hour flight in the back of the small aircraft, sitting behind Patterson where the aircraft’s heat does not reach. Patterson is in Brewster County to explore the Christmas Mountains and Big Bend National Park by air, foot, truck and all-terrain vehicle. by John Waters    more »

The Texas General Land Office has made public the National Park Service’s proposed management plan for the Christmas Mountains. Under the proposal, the Christmas Mountains would be added to Big Bend National Park and managed as a backcountry area of the park. The Park Service proposal cites several advantages of NPS management including permanent protection and preservation, public access and participation in the planning process, NPS expertise in management of backcountry environments.   more »

The National Park Service has submitted a management plan to the Texas General Land Office for the Christmas Mountains. The Park Service is proposing it acquire the Christmas Mountains and incorporate it into the park. It is an excellent plan.   more »

Attendance was notably lower than at some other annual meetings, and the number of ballots cast for new directors decreased from last year’s elections, perhaps more fallout from a lawsuit that has hobbled the association for a year and half. The lawsuit, instigiated by a collection of property owners against others on the board at the time the legal petition was filed, stems from the core allegation that... by Marlys Hersey    more »

In the coming months you will see many changes at Lajitas, the first of which will be making the resort a public resort not only for the benefit of everyone in Texas, but also everyone in the community.   more »

I thought about your request for improvements to the Gazette [“On celebrating 4 years of publication,” October 2007] and could think of nothing. It seemed as if nothing should be changed…and then suddenly   more »

WHERE: South steps of Texas Capitol, Austin, Texas WHEN: Monday, November 5, Noon VISUALS: Large color photos of the Christmas Mountains. Also, the delivery of thousands of petition signatures to Gov. Perry's office.   more »

The land sale had proceeded with scant notice outside the Big Bend until mid-September when the Austin American-Statesman and the Houston Chronicle reported that the original donors on the land, the Mellon Foundation and the Conservation Fund, had communicated to the GLO their opposition of the sale. by John Waters    more »

Brinkley should re-read his Reagan Diaries. More than any other American, Reagan understood that government is not the solution to the problem – in many cases, it is the problem. The Christmas Mountains are no exception. The Land Office has neither the authority nor the funding to restore the land to its natural state. by Jerry Patterson    more »

When I moved to South County to make my fortune with the Roadhouse, one of the major plans was to provide local music on as regular of basis as I could. From previous visits I knew this resource was available. What I didn’t realize and was thrilled to discover was that the music scene “back then” was as much a part of our community as the tortured landscape and muddy brown river. Music was everywhere, running the scale from the phenomenal, to the awful, to the bizarre. It was in the bars, on the porches, around campfires and liable to strike up anywhere. by Don McDowell    more »

It's been an unusually cold & wet & SNOWY winter in the Big Bend. Here are some glimpses from the beginning of the season....   more »

Then I’d go to bed, listen for the wind and the sounds of birds settling in for the night, bands of javelina roaming through my camp, and I’d smell the occasional skunk or fox. Many nights I would wake up – sometime around 2 am – and watch the stars and the moon, pick out the constellations that I know, and very often see shooting stars streak across the night sky. I wondered why parents don’t teach their children to live like this for a while. by Dori Ramsay    more »

“Honestly, I just wanted to get up somewhere and headline a show,” he says now of the inaugural ‘Terlingua-Palooza’ concert held on July 1st, a concert which raised approximately $1,200 for the Boys & Girls Club and helped send the members of its ‘Torch Club’ to a leadership camp in Fort Worth. “I kind of wanted to make it look not like a fundraiser. I just wanted all the Terlingua people to be able to come out and have a good time, eat some food, drink some beer and listen to some music.” And more than 150 of them complied. by Andy Byrnes    more »

Suddenly, I hear crashing on my left, and sure enough, there is a big bear running through the woods away from me. It’s my bear! She stops and turns and sits on her haunches and looks, forgive me, just like the Hamm’s Beer commercial bear. What is she doing? Why did she stop? by Dori Ramsay    more »

It is often said that one function of government is to protect the poor from the rich. Since our present rulers (government) have consistently done the opposite, I agree with Mr. Briggs that we should do away with them, that no government (in this specific case) is better than horribly bad government. But what the Norquist crowd really means is to do away with government except where it benefits the military-industrial complex.   more »

When asked what we should do about the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants already in the United States, members of the Boys & Girls Club of Terlingua said that President Bush should change places with an immigrant for a day.   more »

“My husband and my mother did not have a horrid death,” said Jo Tucker, who lives south of Alpine, and experienced the benefits of hospice care from the local team of providers for the death of both her husband and mother. “There was no agony, no pain, no horrid expression – thanks to hospice…. You couldn’t ask for a better team…. They know how to stay one step ahead…. I knew what was going to happen because they told me…. [My husband] could stay at home, look out the window, listen to music he loved.” by Marlys Hersey    more »

And we’ll all go out to greet her when she comes. Hi There! Joanne and Zero, along with their three children, Joe Dan, Gay, and Vicki, moved to the newly created Terlingua Ranch in September 1972. With an old jukebox in tow, the family arrived at the infamous “Sin City,” the workers’ living area for the Terramar Corporation, which was initially responsible for the Terlingua Ranch development. The children all thought they were on permanent vacation: mountains to climb, dirt roads to tear up, weekend barbeques, dancing to the Cotton-Eyed Joe, and more characters than any comic book. by Gay Kempf Davidson    more »