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The collection104 globes.The rarest itemAn eighteenth-century pocket globe in its original sharkskin case—in its day, a status symbol for those who could afford “a fairly useless thing.”The tiniest artifactAn Earth the size of a gumball that would have dangled from a nineteenth-century pocket watch.The most unlikely location of discoveryIn a bin of basketballs at Goodwill.The collectors“We’re all weirdos, just different levels of weirdo.”Almost every night, as part of his wind-down routine, antiques dealer Jake Moore lies in bed in Central Austin staring at his phone. But he isn’t checking Instagram or Reddit—he’s scrolling through eBay, hunting old globes. On a recent spring evening, as Moore weeded through hundreds of auction listings, his heart began to race. There, on his screen, was a twelve-inch Rand McNally globe,…

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Q:  When I introduced my English husband to Frito pie, I was surprised to find him less than enthused. Could you explain the origins of this ingenious meal, and why Texans find it so tasty?Mary Lowry, AustinA: Ah, the Frito pie, a.k.a. the Frito chili pie, the chili Frito pie, the walking taco, the taco in a bag, the Frito boat, and the Texas straw hat. Whatever you call it, a bag of Fritos corn chips topped with a ladleful of spicy chili, a fistful of grated yellow cheese, a sprinkling of chopped onion and sliced or diced jalapeño, and sometimes even a dollop of sour cream is a dish near and dear to the Texanist’s timeworn old ticker.Though we know that the Frito chip…

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One day in the late 1930s, Daniel Webster Wallace—“80 John,” as he was known in ranching circles—rode his favorite horse, Blondie, from his Mitchell County ranch to the Loraine post office. It was a familiar route for him in this mostly flat, sandy part of the state halfway between Midland and Abilene. He had made the six-mile round trip dozens of times. Wallace collected his mail then walked back to Blondie. In his time, 80 John had broken hundreds of broncs. His tougher-than-bull-hide body had never failed him. But on this day, he lacked the strength to swing his leg over the saddle. A group of men saw him struggling and hustled over to lift 80 John onto Blondie. Wallace was Black. The men who helped…

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Caroline Esquivel, who is 39, maintains wind turbines for RWE, a renewable energy firm that operates 26 wind farms across Texas.  My day starts at 4 a.m. I have an hour-long commute from Odessa to Big Spring, so I leave my house at 4:40 to get to work around 6. If I leave ten minutes late, I hit traffic. I don’t drink coffee or energy drinks, and everyone’s like, “How do you survive?” I don’t know—my parents taught me to work hard at whatever I do, so I just go. In the mornings I hardly even listen to music. Sometimes I’ll pick up a coworker who needs a ride, but mostly I’m just driving. When I get to the site, I meet up with my partner,…

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Mia Arredondo, then a high school sophomore in Del Rio, couldn’t come up with an idea for a business-class project. Frustrated, she did what any teenager does when stymied by homework: she yelled, “Mom!” During their brainstorming session, Mia was considering making skin-care items, such as sugar scrubs and lotions, when her mother, Kathy, remembered a soapmaking lesson she’d taken during a chemistry lab at Texas A&M University in the eighties. “I told her, ‘Hey, why don’t we learn how to make soap?’ ” Kathy recalls. After reading some soapmaking books, they purchased a soap mold, lye, and oils and then created their first batch. They ended up earning some serious extra credit. Within a year, the Arredondos, including Mia’s older sister, Sarah, had founded an actual…

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