The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 99, July 1995 - April, 1996 Page: 129

Book Reviews

Herald of December lo, 1870, cites Chisum with thirty thousand cattle, not ten
thousand). Hugh Martin Childress (Childers) Jr.'s biographical information is in
his ID claim. Reed Anthony is a novel. The volume has misspellings and citation
errors. Footnotes frequently balloon into lengthy annotations.
The volume is attractively designed and has thirteen maps, twelve illustrations,
a selected bibliography, and an index. Maddux writes well, but has not done his
homework; his book is often speculative. At best, it is a convenient introduction
to the highlights of John Hittson's life as a pioneer cattleman.
Austin HARWOOD P. HINTON
Windmills, Drouths, and Cottonseed Cake: A Biased Biography of a West Texas Rancher.
By John A. Haley. Foreword by B. Byron Price. (Fort Worth: Texas Christian
University Press, 1995. Pp. xiii+1o7. Foreword, illustrations, map. ISBN o-
87565-141-0. $19.95.)
In a day when most publishers seem concerned mainly with books that pro-
duce lucrative returns, it is rewarding to find a warm, engaging book that also
contains valuable if somewhat anecdotal historical accounts of ranching and
other activities in West Texas in the first seventy years of this century. Such a
book is John Haley's "biased" biography of his West Texas rancher father John
Furman Haley, who lived from 1897 to 1972. The principal theme that under-
lies the narrative is the dogged determination that it took to survive drouth,
depression, and other climatic, economic, and personal obstacles that people in
this demanding land had to overcome in order not only to survive but to perse-
vere.
The fiery determination of the subject of the volume is no where more evi-
dent than in the later years of his life when, despite warnings to the contrary, he
insisted on riding horses that he should avoid. In one incident, the horse unseat-
ed Haley, who suffered a broken pelvis. It appeared likely the old man would not
be able to continue a lifelong practice of riding horseback. His anger at doctors
for telling him he might have to slow down was all the challenge the old man
needed to prove that he could indeed overcome this obstacle, as he had many
others in his lifetime.
The book is nostalgic, but not distractingly so. It is a pleasant, sometimes
humorous story of a father who was certainly not one of the movers and shakers
in West Texas but who was instead one of the nameless, faceless masses that
made up those born to the region and determined to raise his family and there-
by help civilize a harsh land.
The foreword by B. Byron Price, director of the National Cowboy Hall of
Fame, sets the tone for the volume, and the numerous pencil drawings by Duane
Breyers complement the text in a particularly effective way.
Hardin-Simmons University LAWRENCE CLAYTON
Personal Civil War Letters of General Lawrence Sullivan Ross. Transcribed and com-
piled by Perry Wayne Shelton. Edited by Shelly Morrison. Introduction by

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