Bush was born “with a silver foot in his mouth.”īut his greatest accomplishment in this book is seamlessly weaving together the evolution of Richards' political career - from Travis County commissioner to state treasurer to governor - with his descriptions of the profound changes in Texas' economy and political culture that transpired in the last two decades of the 20th century. He transmits the electrifying drama of how she was catapulted onto the national political stage, calling for a more inclusive government and nation, with what The New Yorker called her “flat Texas twang,” her down-home aphorisms, and her allegation that George H.W. Reid's brilliant recounting of Richards' inspired speech before the Democratic Party's National Convention in 1988 pulses at the book's core as a defining moment in her life. Wade before the Supreme Court, help forge Richards' feminist conscience, and become a lifelong friend. It was there, too, she met the young Sarah Weddington, who went on to argue Roe vs. He profiles the wild and wacky political and music culture of Austin in the 1970s, where Ann and David completed their educations and became young leaders in the Democratic Party. He reveals Ann as the pretty, hard-working teenager born into poverty who distinguishes herself in speech and debate in her native Waco, going on to graduate from Baylor and marry - and eventually divorce - her high school sweetheart, the distinguished attorney David Richards.

University of Texas Press, $27 See More Collapse Nor does he sufficiently appreciate her helpful 2004 book I'm Not Slowing Down: Winning My Battle With Osteoporosis, alerting women to the bone disease that afflicted both her grandmothers, her mom and herself.Let the People In: The Life and Times of Ann Richards Having covered her when it was on my beat at The Dallas Morning News, I don't think Reid sufficiently emphasizes the role Richards played as cheerleader for the Texas film and music business. Previously unpublished, the tender, jokey correspondence between rowdy Richards and the renowned writer, whose life she anchored for 17 years, were found in her archive at UT and Shrake’s in the Wittliff Collections at Texas State University in San Marcos. So it’s touching to read the funny, affectionate notes that she and Shrake, the great love of her life after that, exchanged when apart. The hardest thing she ever did, harder than recovery, Richards said, was her 1984 divorce. Mary’s Chemical Dependency Services facility at the Riverside Medical Center in Minneapolis and began the hard work of recovery. Hours later, a terrified but willing Richards, then 47, boarded a flight to St.

Let the People In by Jan Reid