Sherrie S. McLeRoy

American history is teeming with unconventional, trailblazing Lone Star women with big, unprecedented achievements outstanding, outrageous, outre women who know all about being Texas Big and being first. Texas s own Bessie Coleman was the first black person in the world to earn a pilot s license. Students and typists the world over breathed a sigh of relief when San Antonio born Bette Nesmith Graham released Mistake Out, now known as Liquid Paper(r). Way ahead of the curve, University of Texas graduate Aida Nydia Barrera saw the need for bilingual educational programming and in 1970 started Carrascolendas, the first television show of its kind in the country. In 1981, El Paso s Sandra Day O Connor became the first female justice of the United States Supreme Court. Join author Sherrie McLeRoy for an introduction to the exceptional women of Lone Star history."

In 1941, Greer Garson earned an Academy Award nomination for her portrayal of Fort Worth's Edna Gladney in Blossoms in the Dust." All eyes turned toward the small yet mighty Gladney and her fight for children's rights and adoption reform. Born in 1886, Edna Gladney was labeled as "illegitimate" from birth and, as an adult, lobbied for that label's removal from all birth certificates. During World War I, when many women left the home to work, Edna opened an innovative daytime nursery to care for the children of these workingwomen. What became the Gladney Center for Adoption has changed the lives of families and children the world over. Author and Gladney parent Sherrie McLeRoy tells Edna's amazing story alongside the making of the movie that launched Edna and adoption reform beyond Fort Worth's borders to national recognition.."

Quick! Do you know...Which college was the first in the world to award a degree in jazz? Which state had the most drive-in movie theaters? Who was the first person to push a peanut up Pike's Peak with his nose? Who invented Frito Pie? Well, all the answers can be found here in Texas. 'Texas Brag' is a long cherished tradition in the nation's second largest state. But the fact is that Texas does have more than its share of unique people, places, events, inventions, and products: many of them the first, the largest, or the only representative of its kind. ""Braggin' on Texas"" takes an accurate but less than serious look at the Lone Star State - both past and present - by presenting some of the more obscure, convoluted, and occasionally outrageous achievements of Texans and their state. So sit back and prepare to enjoy Texas as you've never known it before!

Her name was Rebecca Aston Brown, but the world knew her as Miss Bettie. Artist, world traveler, and for the times most shocking of all, a spinster to the end of her days, Bettie's life has been the subject of conjecture and rumor.