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damon's real texas bbq exteriorWhen Brandon Cruz finally found the potential smoker for his future restaurant, back in 2007, it was on one of the worst days of his life. Driving by the Jack in the Box in Wharton, he spotted a truck and trailer loaded with old propane tanks. Cruz offered the driver $175 cash for a sleek 380-gallon tank he could turn into a smoker. The driver refused, saying it could fetch $300 at the scrapyard. Just then, the driver noticed a flat tire on his trailer and asked Cruz if he had a jack big enough to help. “For a hundred and twenty-five dollars I have a jack,” Cruz told him, and the driver agreed to part with the tank at Cruz’s reduced price.Cruz was elated,…

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How to Make Sure You Are Registered to Vote in TexasIn late August, Governor Greg Abbott announced that Texas election officials had removed more than 1.1 million names from the voter rolls. Many of these removals were consistent with routine election maintenance; more than 457,000 of the removed names belonged to deceased Texans, and another 134,000 belonged to Texans who had confirmed to officials that they had moved. The governor’s press release claimed that officials had also found the names of more than 6,500 possible noncitizens on the voting rolls, as well as more than 6,000 Texans legally barred from exercising the franchise because of felony convictions.Still, the single largest group among the removed names belonged to voters on the state’s “suspense list,” many of whom could remain eligible voters. Here, we’ll explain how to…

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adan banuelos bella hadid window to the westI ended up in a black SUV with Adan Banuelos and Bella Hadid for a reason most Texans are familiar with—it was too damn hot. It’s 5:45 p.m., and we’re at a Weatherford ranch owned by sports media company Teton Ridge. Hadid is in girlfriend mode. “I just think he’s going to start losing it if he’s in the sun for too long,” she says. Hadid, who landed from New York minutes prior, is a vision even in the unyielding ranch sun. (Banuelos picked her up in a helicopter from the airport.) They’ve choppered here to promote Window to the West, Teton Ridge’s six-part collection of short films that aim to encapsulate Western culture via vignettes of athletes, craftsmen, and musicians. The series opener, Horse Sense,…

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Politics in the PulpitTom Guyton is about as small-town Texan as a man can be—right down to his distinctive regional accent and easy smile. The former high school band director serves as secretary of the school board in Lockhart, about an hour northeast of San Antonio, and pastor of Promiseland Lockhart, a nondenominational evangelical church. He’s also a husband to Lisa, who coleads the church with him and works for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, and, according to his bio on the Lockhart ISD board page, the “proud father of three ‘perfect’ daughters.” He sees all of these roles as part of a life lived in service to God. And he is adamant that religion and politics shouldn’t mix.Unless you follow school district politics, he…

The post As Election Rhetoric Intensifies, Texas Religious Leaders Feel the Heat appeared first on Texas Monthly.

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texas excess historic signs robin saylorOur series Texas Excess celebrates the hobbyists and hoarders who crisscross the state—and sometimes the world—to add to their pet collections. With obsessions ranging from Santas to salt shakers, these Texans take collecting to the extreme. The collectionMore than 250 historic signs.Years in the makingThirty.Most expensive acquisitionA 1920s Buick sign from a museum in Minnesota. “I could have bought a brand-new Corvette for what that one cost.”Most difficult to restoreA 24-by-14-foot Coca-Cola sign that has towered over Abilene’s downtown since the 1940s. With 590 bulbs to rewire and damage from decades of exposure to the harsh West Texas weather, the restoration took seven months to complete. As the sun sets on Abilene, Robert Hoemke’s latest obsession is just coming to life. His 100-plus neon signs—favorites among his 250-strong…

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texanist public land private ranchThe state of Texas is, to put it mildly, one heck of a vast expanse of land. To wit, ours is, by a fairly long shot, the largest of the contiguous United States and, among them all, second only to behemoth Alaska. For illustrative purposes, consider that within the 268,596 square miles of Texas that spread out between Perryton, in the Panhandle; Brownsville, in the Rio Grande Valley; El Paso, in far West Texas; and Orange, in the Golden Triangle of southeast Texas, you could squeeze almost fifty whole Connecticuts. And, believe the Texanist or not, the state could also encompass nearly 175 Rhode Islands, though that’s not really saying a whole bunch, as the mighty King Ranch alone is almost the same size as…

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jeng chi restaurant mooncakesThe fifteenth day of the eighth month of the Chinese lunisolar calendar commemorates the end of the fall harvest, with celebrants lighting lanterns and exchanging mooncakes—decorative filled pastries. This year the Mid-Autumn Festival falls on September 17, and at Jeng Chi restaurant, preparations began many months ago.Tucked away in the suburb of Richardson, just twenty minutes north of Dallas, Jeng Chi has an unassuming strip mall exterior that gives way to a vast kitchen, where a team of five makes hundreds of mooncakes by hand every morning in the four months leading up to the festival season. At the head of the assembly line, Yuan and Mei Teng, who own the restaurant, oversee quality control.The Tengs’ mooncakes have called three continents home. Yuan’s father founded…

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Growing up, J. B. Manning spent many weekends at his family’s deer lease in South Texas or on another parcel of land they owned outside of Georgetown. He’d sit in the blind for hours, peering through a narrow window and writing in his hunting journal, where he kept meticulous lists of all the animals he’d spotted. “It taught me to be in tune with nature,” he says. Manning now draws on that love of the outdoors to create wooden jigsaw puzzles featuring his photos of Texas and Western landscapes. Manning, now 43, spent his twenties and thirties “doing the corporate thing” in Houston. In 2011, struggling with burnout, he quit his job at an engineering firm and began a five-year stint on the road, hiking and learning…

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bobwhite quail illustrationEach month, we get to know one of the state’s many wonderful and quirky critters. Latin Name: Colinus virginianusSize: Six to seven inches tallTexas habitat: Open grasslands, shrublands, and prairies This beloved game bird’s lonesome, high-pitched whistle—“Bob-white! Poor-bob-white!”—marks the turning of the seasons across Texas. During the typical mating period, in April and May, male bobwhite quails often perch on fence posts, the better for the ladies to spot them while they sing. And in late October, hunters celebrate the start of quail season: a time-honored tradition of pacing through tall grass alongside a loyal bird dog, waiting for the moment when a covey of a dozen or so quail flushes, or scatters, in a noisy explosion of feathers. But bobwhites are in serious trouble, having declined…

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ken paxton bexar county lawsuitA state district court judge on Monday denied a request by Attorney General Ken Paxton to block a Bexar County plan to mail voter registration forms to county residents ahead of the November election, saying the request was moot.Bexar County attorneys argued in a hearing before Judge Antonia Arteaga on Monday that there was no reason for the court to issue an injunction because the forms were mailed last week, according to the San Antonio Report. Paxton’s office submitted an updated request before the hearing asking that no additional letters be sent out.“The target of the mailing—qualified individuals who recently moved to or within Bexar County—have received those forms, and perhaps have already returned them,” said Bexar County assistant criminal district attorney Robert W. Piatt…

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