The history of the Old West has deep roots in South Texas where the Wild Horse Desert was a lawless land controlled by no authority. The western region of South Texas, from San Antonio to Corpus Christi, stretching west and south to the Rio Grande, was the birthplace of the big cattle ranches, the cattle barons, rustlers, hide thieves, outlaws, and bad men operating on both sides of the border. Murphy Givens brings the stories of the Old West to life in "Great Tales From the History of South Texas"

Adventurers, outlaws, settlers, cowboys, ranchers, and entrepreneurs from the United States, Europe, and Mexico all came to the coastal bend of Texas, struggling against nature and their fellow man to make their homes and livelihoods. Corpus Christi nearly disappeared during two wars, but grew and prospered in another. In this account, the tales of its growth are combined with the stories of its residents to reveal its intriguing history.

Recollections Of Other Days is a compilation of memoirs of early settlers of Corpus Christi and the Nueces Valley of South Texas. The great value of their accounts, both written down and told-to, lies in the fact that they lived through the times they recalled. Some had first-hand knowledge of Corpus Christi in the 1850s when it was a struggling frontier outpost. Robert and William Adams tended their flocks in the early years of the great sheep industry of South Texas. Anna Moore Schwien, daughter of a slave, Andrew Anderson, son of a bay pilot, and Eli Merriman, a doctor's son, shed light on "what it was like" during the dark times of the Civil War. Thomas Noakes wrote about the famous Noakes Raid of 1875 while he retained a vivid memory of the sight of his burning store. E. H. Caldwell, W. S. Rankin, Annie Marie Kelly, Mrs. Delmas Givens, and Roy Terrell provide unique accounts of Corpus Christi at the end of the 19th Century and early years of the 20th Century. Ruth Dodson and J. Frank Dobie offer fascinating pictures of their own ranch lives in the valley watered by the Nueces River. Louis Rawalt describes the long white island where he came to die but found a new life. They bore the heat and burden and violence of the frontier. They endured hard times. Their legacy is the Texas we know today. Their stories are part of our history. And part of ourselves.

Neither rich, famous, nor notorious, Whiting was a loyal officer in the U.S. Army for three decades during the middle of the 19th century. His career began in the time of Daniel Webster and John C. Calhoun and coincided with a period in American history when the country was moving West in those tumultuous years of Manifest Destiny.