In a world in which about 18 guys own every media outlet in the
country, and in which about half the outlets are doing stories
about the Ten Best Places for Barbecued Sushi, my journalistic alma
mater has been a breath of fresh air. Not to mention courage and
highly unusual memories.
In a world in which about 18 guys own every media outlet in the country, and in which about half the outlets are doing stories about the Ten Best Places for Barbecued Sushi, my journalistic alma mater has been a breath of fresh air. Not to mention courage and highly unusual memories.
I think of my years at The Texas Observer, 1970 to 1976, the way some folks think of their college years: a happy, golden time, full of sunshine and laughter and beer. No one who has ever worked for the Observer made much money at it, but we never thought money was particularly important at the Observer. We liked to root for the good guys and nail the bad guys. Nailed quite a few of them, too – ask Ben Barnes. Lyndon B. Johnson used to cuss “those Observer boys” somethin’ awful – even when the boys were girls.
Think of almost any Texas writer you’ve heard of in the last 50 years, and you’ll find that almost every one of them either worked for or wrote for the Observer: Ronnie Dugger, Willie Morris, J. Frank Dobie, Billy Lee Brammmer, Larry Goodwyn, Larry L. King, Larry McMurtry, Jim Hightower, etc.
We never had any money, so we used to travel the state on a sort of underground railroad. Clif Olafson, our beloved business manager, would provide us with a list of subscribers in whatever direction we were headed. Come sundown, we’d stop and call the nearest subscriber. The invariable response was: “From the Observer? Gosh, can you come over for a beer, can you stay for dinner, can you stay the night?” And they’d call the other two liberals in town, and the four of us would have a whale of a party.
I’ve spent more nights on the sofas of public school teachers, union organizers, civil-rights workers, nuns, preachers, public defenders, environmental activists, pacifists, liberal legislators and people who just generally care about Texas than I can possibly remember. That’s why I know this state is full of heroes.
We were so poor at the Observer that Clif used to sleep under the Addressograph. I stole pencils from the governor’s office. (They said “State of Texas” and had the seal on ’em – very nice pencils.) We got some of our best stories because that’s where our cars happened to break down.
In addition to crusading for Truth, Justice and the American Way, Observer editors tend to have an unseemly amount of fun. Let’s face it: The Great State has a large loony streak, and it has always been the delight of the Observer to chronicle the more ludicrous aspects of life in the Lone Star.
The time two Republicanesses duked it out at a meeting of the state Republican Executive Committee remains my all-time favorite bout – even better than the last all-House duke-out in the Lege, when our elected representatives threw chairs and chili dogs at one another while a barbershop quartet sang “I Have A Dream, Dear.” That was the duke-out that caused them to ban food on the floor of the House.
Larry Goodwyn, a former editor and the great historian of the populist movement, once called the Observer the finest graduate school of journalism in America. That’s because the Observer’s standards were set by its founding editor, Ronnie Dugger. Dugger is both committed to social justice and the most incurably fair reporter I ever knew. I’m not claiming that all the succeeding editors have lived up to Dugger’s standards, but he sure set ’em high.
The Observer changes a bit as it goes from editor to editor. Some have been a little doctrinaire, some (like moi) relished the comedy more, while others emphasized the arts. Hightower’s Observer was like a loaf of that whole-grain bread; you knew it was good for you. But the meat and potatoes of the magazine has always been Texas politics. The incumbent editor, Lou DuBose, is bilingual and has more good stuff on Mexico and South Texas than you can get anywhere else.
Our state will become majority-minority in just a few short years, and Chicanos will be the dominant group. You think you’re reading anything now that’s getting you ready for what that will be like? Try The Texas Observer.
What you won’t find in the Observer is stories tailored for yuppies, the famous “upscale reader” so loved by advertisers. The Observer doesn’t do Ten Best Barbecue Joints, Ten Best Ice Cream Parlors, Ten Best Places to Buy This, That or the Other. The Observer won’t teach you how to be a consumer. It’s not in business to make more money for its advertisers.
This is what the Observer claims as its goal: “We will serve no group or party but will hew hard to the truth as we find it and the right as we see it. We are dedicated to the whole truth, to human values above all interests, to the rights of human-kind as the foundation of democracy, we will take orders from none but our own conscience, and never will we overlook or misrepresent the truth to serve the interests of the powerful or cater to the ignoble in the human spirit.”
