In the decades preceding the Civil War, few figures in the United States were as influential or as controversial as Sam Houston. In Sam Houston, James L. Haley explores Houston's momentous career and the complex man behind it. Haley's fifteen years of research and writing have produced possibly the most complete, most personal, and most readable Sam Houston biography ever written. Drawn from personal papers never before available as well as the papers of others in Houston's circle, this biography will delight anyone intrigued by Sam Houston, Texas history, Civil War history, or America's tradition of rugged individualism.

Texas is the country's second largest state by size and population. It has a unique and varied history, having been ruled by a succession of nations - from which the term, six flags over Texas, sprang, before becoming an independent republic. From its traditional oil, cattle and cotton industries to the modern energy, electronics, computer, aerospace and biomedical industries, Texas has become an economic powerhouse. It's known for its low taxes, diverse population, thriving universities and arts scenes. Exploring the state s fascinating history, people, myths, culture, and trivia, The Handy Texas Answer Book takes an in-depth look look at this fascinating and diverse state with the out-sized personality.

John R. Cook was an American original. He witnessed or participated in a string of important events that shaped the nation and sculpted the history of the West. Born in Ohio in 1844, Cook moved with his family to Kansas. He joined the Union Army at sixteen and fought along the Kansas-Missouri border, in Indian Territory, and in Arkansas. After the Civil War, he ventured out to establish a homestead and work cattle. Several hardships forced Cook to try his luck at various enterprises. He became a prospector in New Mexico, a buffalo hunter in Texas and Kansas, and an Indian fighter.
Santa Fe, Adobe Walls, Fort Elliot, and Rath City were among Cook's Great Plains haunts. His accounts of the 1878 Hunters War against Comanche leader Black Horse and the battle of Yellow House Canyon near present-day Lubbock are rare glimpses into the last great effort of the Comanche people to maintain their way of life. He eventually found employment as a government scout and guide with the army.
In later years, Cook recorded his adventures in a modest volume, The Border and the Buffalo, first published in a small edition in 1907. Historians quickly recognized it as one of the most important first- hand accounts about buffalo hunting ever written. The organization of hunts, camp routines, and marketing of the buffalo hides are all described in detail.
Award-winning author and Texas historian James L. Haley provides a new foreword in this reprint edition of this classic of Texana.

Apaches: A History and Culture Portrait, James L. Haley's dramatic saga of the Apaches' doomed guerrilla war against the whites, was a radical departure from the method followed by previous histories of white-native conflict. Arguing that "you cannot understand the history unless you understand the culture," Haley begins by discussing the lifeway of the Apaches--their mythology and folklore, religious customs, everyday life, and social mores. Haley then explores the tumultuous decades of trade and treaty and of betrayal and bloodshed that preceded the Apaches' final military defeat in 1886. He emphasizes figures that played a decisive role in the conflict: Mangas Coloradas, Cochise, and Geronimo on the one hand, and Royal Whitman, George Crook, and John Clum on the other. With a new preface that places the book in the context of contemporary scholarship, Apaches is a well-rounded overview of Apache history and culture.

Gen. Phil Sheridan called the Red River War of 1874 the most successful Indian campaign ever waged. Many of its incidents have become frontier legends, but only here is the extraordinary episode chronicled in full in all of its intricate ad amazing detail. Author/historian James L. Haley has carefully analyzed the causes of the Indian unrest, centering upon the great buffalo slaughter which threatened to destroy forever the foundation of Indian life. The competing factions which shaped the course of events during the conflicts---war and peace factions' competing for control within the Indian tribes, officers' competing for commands and promotions within the U.S. Army and the Indian Bureau's competing for policy control within government bureaucracies--are brilliantly researched and described, as are the battle strategies and engagements that made the Buffalo War such a curious blend of savagery, heroics, accidents and confusion on both sides. Mr. Haley's extensive research heavily on contemporary letters and reports, and his many new findings overturned a number of myths and prejudices which had surfaced during the hundred years since the Red River uprising. The result is an exciting, authentic narrative filled with colorful events and personalities of a crucial time in the history of the American frontiers, included are fifty-eight rare photographs of the Indian leaders, buffalo hunters, army officers and Indian agents who played roles in the history of the Buffalo War.