Customer Reviews

Big Thicket Legacy (Temple Big Thicket Series)

5 star:		(3)
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3 star:		(1)
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Collaboratively compiled and co-edited by lifelong naturalists Campbell and Lynn Loughmiller, Big Thicket Legacy is a compendium of engaging and informative anecdotes about life and living in the Big Thicket country, which is a nearly impassable area of Texas territory that only a few pioneers dared to brave. In those days, only the heartiest of individuals and families could call a place within the heart of the Big Thicket home; their tales have become a part of Texas folklore, and in Big Thicket Legacy are preserved to available to the general reading public, thereby recounting a very special experienced wisdom for new generations of Texans.

I grew up in East Texas and have lived around the Big Thicket all my life. As a child, I heard my grandfather and his brother tell tales of the bears and "panthers" they had hunted in the early 1900's. I picked this book up one afternoon and began to skim it, and I was hooked within minutes. I couldn't put it down. In the 60's and 70's the authors interviewed many older residents of the Big Thicket area, allowing the old-timers to simply relate their rememberances, from the 1860's on up into the oil boom and logging days of the early 20th century. The dialect is distinct, and the authors do a good job of conveying the pronunciation. The stories these people tell of the hardships and yet the wonder of living in a true wilderness is simply fascinating. If you have any interest in the Big Thicket area of Texas, or if you just enjoy tales of life in the "wild and wooly days", then you will certainly enjoy these stories. It's truly a wonder that these folks survived the hard life and wild animals! My wife and I were so enthralled with these stories,that we found time a few days later to drive over and visit some of the remaining thicket, near Saratoga, TX.

I am in the process of reading the book. It is very interesting. I just bought a Black Mouth Cur puppy and the book was recommended on the American Black Mouth Cur website.

James E. Knox says:

I too was raised in the and around the Big Thicket in the 40's and 50's. As a youth, I spent countless nights in the Thicket hunting coons and following the hounds in the night with only carbide lamps for light, and remember many of the family names like Bevil and Wiggins. I also own an original 1980 edition of "Legacy" and agree totally with Joe's review; but would go one step further. As you read these first person accounts of life in the early 1900's, you are reading the real life circumstances of the parents of the "Greatest Generation"; those who won WWII. If you listen quietly as you read, you can hear the anvils of hardship and perserverence upon which character is built; you can then compare it to our society of today and arrive at some interesting conclusions as to the directions of the American character and society.

These voices of the past will likely echo pleasantly in your head for days; and you may find it necessary to return to selected stories, like a box of candies.