Hoein' the Short Rows

If there was any pleasure at all in hoeing, it was in the short row soon hoed rather than the one that in the day’s high heat seemed to stretch to shimmering eternity. And that’s what this collection of Texas folklore is, a series of short rows, easily and pleasantly hoed, promising a great crop as a reward for the reader’s labors.

Here are high toned women and hayburners, loud pipes and calaveras, brown derbies and battles royal. And, oh yes, Welsh mains. And if these seem like unfamiliar rows, they are nonetheless pleasantly hoed, and in the process much will be learned about railway lingo; the machismo of cockfighting and of the customized pickup; the aesthetic, didactic, and mystical aspects of baptistry paintings in Texas churches; the ways some folk honor the Dead on their Day.

There are humorous recollections of religious mores; the summer revival meeting; the ritual of a hog drive; and sagas of families, the Santa Rita rig, poetry by cowboys and common folk alike, and more in this rich acreage.

FRANCIS EDWARD ABERNETHY was Regents Professor Emeritus of English at Stephen F. Austin State University, the executive secretary and editor of the Texas Folklore Society, the curator of exhibits for the East Texas Historical Association, and a member of the Texas Institute of Letters. In addition to editing twenty-one Texas Folklore Society publications, he wrote Singin' Texas, Legends of Texas’ Heroic Age, and all three volumes of the Texas Folklore Society history, published by the University of North Texas Press.