Turn Your Eyes Toward Texas: Pioneers Sam and Mary Maverick

As vast as Texas is today, it comes across as so much larger through the Mavericks' eyes. Like most people, all I knew about Samuel A. Maverick was that his name first became associated with unbranded cattle, and then extrapolated to mean anyone of independent thought who blazed their own trail. What I didn't know was Maverick's remarkable involvement and influence in the history of Texas. Maverick fell in love with San Antonio in the days before the Battle of the Alamo. From those days until after the Civil War, with Texas itself under four often-competing governments (Mexico, the Republic of Texas, the United States and the Confederacy), Maverick remained a strong Texas advocate and patriot, always building his family's life around his vision of what Texas could someday become. Both Maverick and his wife Mary kept personal journals and letters throughout their lives, so we get an intimate look into their hopes and fears through the growth of Texas, and of their own family. The author ties Maverick's land-buying and political journals together with Mary's diaries of life at home, weaving a very readable picture of their lives.