Here are 12 books that Alamo Traces fans have personally recommended if you like
Alamo Traces.
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Davy Crockett – King of the Wild Frontier on television in the early 1950s directed my attention to the Alamo story. This interest stayed with me over the years and became a life-long quest of research and discovery. I have written five Alamo-related books, many magazine and journal articles, have appeared on a number of panels, and given talks on the subject. I’m a charter member of The Alamo Society and for a number of years served as the editor of the society’s The Alamo Journal. My studies taught me to question many traditional aspects of the Alamo battle – a sometimes dangerous endeavor involving such a legendary event.
This book served as the starting point for many present-day Alamo historians. Written by future American Poet Laureate Robert Penn Warren, and enhanced with vivid illustrations by noted Western artist William Moyers, it is the perfect introduction to the Alamo story for young readers. A copy remains on my bookshelf sixty years after its discovery.
Remembering the Alamo is a tale of extraordinary courage and riveting adventure. For thirteen days, 189 men lead by Davy Crockett, Colonel William Travis and hopelessly outnumbered, held off the Mexican army lead by General Santa Anna at the Mission San Antonio de Valero-the Alamo. Their valiant sacrifice for the cause of Texas liberty became the rallying cry, "Remember the Alamo!"
Davy Crockett – King of the Wild Frontier on television in the early 1950s directed my attention to the Alamo story. This interest stayed with me over the years and became a life-long quest of research and discovery. I have written five Alamo-related books, many magazine and journal articles, have appeared on a number of panels, and given talks on the subject. I’m a charter member of The Alamo Society and for a number of years served as the editor of the society’s The Alamo Journal. My studies taught me to question many traditional aspects of the Alamo battle – a sometimes dangerous endeavor involving such a legendary event.
The most influential Alamo book of the 1940s, and a major research source for the 1955 Alamo film,The Last Command. It may be one of, if not the first to get away from a legendary telling of the Alamo story. Western writer Myers also focused on the Alamo’s triumvirate, William Barret Travis, James Bowie, and Davy Crockett, as well as their adversary, General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, giving insight into their lives and the motivations which brought them together at this battle. Myers’ opening and closing paragraphs may be the best prose of any Alamo book.
"The majority of the stories of the Alamo fight have been partly legendary, partly hearsay and at best fragmentary. It has been left to John Myers Myers to present an exhaustively researched book which reveals the chronicle of the siege of the Alamo in an entirely different light. . . . Myers' story will stand as the best that has yet been written on the Alamo. . . . It's a classic." - Boston Post "Here is a historian with the vitality and drive to match his subject. A reporter of the first rank, he can clothe the dry bones…
Davy Crockett – King of the Wild Frontier on television in the early 1950s directed my attention to the Alamo story. This interest stayed with me over the years and became a life-long quest of research and discovery. I have written five Alamo-related books, many magazine and journal articles, have appeared on a number of panels, and given talks on the subject. I’m a charter member of The Alamo Society and for a number of years served as the editor of the society’s The Alamo Journal. My studies taught me to question many traditional aspects of the Alamo battle – a sometimes dangerous endeavor involving such a legendary event.
Acknowledged by many Alamo historians as the best book on the subject, it is certainly the most readable. Popular historian Walter Lord presented a solid history book written as a novel and brought to light many of the lesser-known personalities and events of the Alamo siege and battle. Lord also included intriguing addendums “Riddles of the Alamo,” “Men who fell at the Alamo,” and a solid list of sources. If other books inspired people to read more about the famous battle, Lord’s book created the desire to plunge deeper into the sources and begin writing about the Alamo. I have a copy of this book, signed by Lord to me, dated March 6, 1991, the 155th anniversary of the Alamo battle.
On the morning of March 6, 1836, in an old abandoned mission called the Alamo, a small Texas garrison fought to the death rather than yield to an overwhelming army of Mexicans. Through the years the garrison's heroic stand has become so clothed in folklore and romance that the truth has nearly been lost. In A Time to Stand Walter Lord rediscovers and recreates the whole fascinating story. From contemporary documents, diaries, and letters, he has mined a wealth of fresh information that throws intriguing sidelights on the epic of the Alamo. What were the defenders like? Why did they…
Davy Crockett – King of the Wild Frontier on television in the early 1950s directed my attention to the Alamo story. This interest stayed with me over the years and became a life-long quest of research and discovery. I have written five Alamo-related books, many magazine and journal articles, have appeared on a number of panels, and given talks on the subject. I’m a charter member of The Alamo Society and for a number of years served as the editor of the society’s The Alamo Journal. My studies taught me to question many traditional aspects of the Alamo battle – a sometimes dangerous endeavor involving such a legendary event.
There have been many novels written about the Alamo. Friend and fellow member of the Western Writers of America, Tom Clagett, tells his unique story by only presenting the last two days of the siege. On the Texan side we experience the battle through the three Taylor brothers and Susannah Dickinson, and the Mexican side via Colonel Juan Morales, all historical participants. Clagett blends fact, fiction, and myth, holding a reader’s interest throughout. One can’t help but care for the characters and hope for the best, even though there is only one way an Alamo story can end. That is great writing!
The final 13 hours at the Alamo began around 5 o’clock on the afternoon of March 5, 1836. Colonel William Barrett Travis drew a line in the dirt with his sword and asked all those who would stay and fight to cross it. Everyone there knew that General Santa Anna’s final attack on the fort was coming. Hopes, fears and destinies played out that night for four people. Susannah Dickinson, a woman of surprising courage, waited inside the chapel cradling her baby daughter, while her husband, Captain Almeron Dickinson, commanded the cannon battery atop the chapel. Young James Taylor had…
I love history that is about people. The discoveries they made or the adventures they had (or endured) are thrilling and fascinating, but it’s the people who make it compelling. From Ernest Shackleton dumping handfuls of gold on the ice to show his stranded men he was committed to getting them out of Antarctica alive, to a fussy young William Travis writing desperately for help that would never come, and being of the first to die during the attack on the Alamo…the best books make those events, the times, and the stakes very very real. And the very best histories give you the humanity of the choices and decisions that led them there.
One thing my selections have in common is my own awe for the amount of research that went into the work. In this instance, Mr. Donovan has gone back to original sources, found old letters, telegrams, newspaper reports, interviews with survivors, and so on, turning the famous participants (e.g. Jim Bowie, Davy Crockett, etc.) from the stiff, stock characters of popular imagination or media and mockery into recognizable human beings: Jim Bowie with his tenacious will (see the description of a duel fought on an island in a river against several opponents) and a heart-broken by the death of a beloved wife, or Crockett, an out-of-office politician, and national figure, heading West in the hopes of finding a new beginning.
None of them planned on being a hero, but, at the end, were willing to die for their friends and their adopted home of Texas.
For almost two centuries, the last stand at the Alamo has been recognized as a defining moment in America's history. On February 23, 1836, a Mexican army thousands of soldiers strong attacked a makeshift garrison of about 200 Texas settlers-among them, Davy Crockett, James Bowie, and William Barret Travis-holed up in the abandoned mission on the outskirts of San Antonio. The Texans refused to surrender, and for almost two weeks, the immense force lay siege to the fort, bombarding its occupants with a constant barrage of artillery fire. Then, in the predawn hours of March 6, the Mexican troops unleashed…
My entire life I’ve been a historian, a treasure hunter, and a crime solver, which is likely why I became a broadcast journalist and investigative reporter. Having worked cases, worked with police, and asked the questions I believe the public wanted answered, there isn’t much which gets by me. I see every story as a movie and every scene in life as a story that needs telling. One of my passions has always been genealogy which fits right into all of the above. I live by a simple saying, “Be a student of history, not a victim of it.”
Forget the Alamo is a take-off on the popular saying at the time in Texas, “Remember the Alamo,” which was a battle cry. I love this book because of the logic the authors use and the tremendous hard-core research of letters and documents, to show why one of America’s legendary tales was a lot more myth. The true story of “why” more than the actual outcome continues to be battled today. John Wayne’s version, which many of us grew up with, was so far from the truth, it boggles the mind. The documentation in this book and the logic behind the letters that were written reveal the sad truth of what happened and more importantly what led up to the tragic end for so many brave souls.
“Lively and absorbing. . ." — The New York Times Book Review
"Engrossing." —Wall Street Journal
“Entertaining and well-researched . . . ” —Houston Chronicle
Three noted Texan writers combine forces to tell the real story of the Alamo, dispelling the myths, exploring why they had their day for so long, and explaining why the ugly fight about its meaning is now coming to a head.
Every nation needs its creation myth, and since Texas was a nation before it was a state, it's no surprise that its myths bite deep. There's no piece of…
A French emperor, nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte, Napoleon III who dreamed of an empire in Latin America and invaded Mexico; an Austrian aristocrat, the Habsburg Ferdinand Maximilian, ruling Mexico as a monarchy; Benito Juárez, who was born into an impoverished Mexican village but later became president, defying and defeating these European emperors. These are the extraordinary characters and events that led me to fall in love with Mexico’s history, and write my book, The Last Emperor of Mexico.
Mexican history is full of abrupt reversals. The life of Santa Anna, many times president and dictator of Mexico, is a wonderful example. Infamous in the United States for the Battle of the Alamo, where he gave no quarter to the defenders fighting for Texan independence, the general was vilified in Mexico for the far more heinous crime of losing Texas, once Mexican territory.
Two years later, his political career over, he lost his leg repelling French marines who were trying to seize the port of Veracruz. Santa Anna was now the saviour of Mexico, returning to power in 1841 and, for good measure, having his amputated leg buried with full military honours. Soon, however, he was forced to limp from office while an angry mob exhumed the leg, dragging it round Mexico City to humiliate their former leader. Yet this was far from the last time he held power.…
Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna (1794-1876) is one of the most famous, and infamous, figures in Mexican history. Six times the country's president, he is consistently depicted as a traitor, a turncoat, and a tyrant-the exclusive cause of all of Mexico's misfortunes following the country's independence from Spain. He is also, as this biography makes clear, grossly misrepresented. Drawing on seventeen years of research into the politics of independent Mexico, Will Fowler provides a revised picture of Santa Anna's life, with new insights into his activities in his bailiwick of Veracruz and in his numerous military engagements. The Santa Anna…
I have always loved reading and feel a natural attraction to history and the lessons it can give us. I want to learn something new whenever I pick up a book but also enjoy the story and characters as well. Since 2010, I have authored six historical novels of my own and am working on my seventh. I carefully weave years of extensive research into a fast-paced, exciting story that pushes all the right buttons! Intrigue, love, fear, and hope are integral parts of my novels, and I hope along the way, my readers will gain a new insight into a different culture or era they never knew before.
Have you ever wondered what happens during a significant moment in history and no one is left to tell the tale? Three Roads to the Alamo by William C. Davis helps give a wonderful backstory to the characters leading up to the famous 1836 Texas battle against the Mexican army under Santa Ana. The pages are filled with details obtained through original documents of the era both in the United States and Mexico, making the characters come alive as never before. The incorrigible James Bowie, loyal commander William Barret Travis, and the renowned Davy Crockett give the ultimate sacrifice against insurmountable odds, and in doing so, shape the course of history forever.
"William C. Davis's Three Roads to the Alamo is far and away the best account of the Alamo I have ever read. The portraits of Crockett, Bowie, and Travis are brilliantly sketched in a fast-moving story that keeps the reader riveted to the very last word." — Stephen B. Oates
Three Roads to the Alamois the definitive book about the lives of David Crockett, James Bowie and William Barret Travis—the legendary frontiersmen and fighters who met their destiny at the Alamo in one of the most famous and tragic battles in American history—and about what really happened in that battle.
Selwyn Parker is an award-winning journalist, author, speaker and pianist. In journalism he focuses on transformational contemporary issues like the new era in energy, the upheaval in banking, the revolution in transportation and the fast-moving world of investment. However most of his dozen books – novels and non-fiction -- are rooted in landmark historical events whose effects still register today.
Professional investors troop to Wharton School to sit at the feet of professor Siegel and learn about why stocks – or shares – should be the bedrock of any investment strategy for the very obvious reason that it’s the best way to capitalise on the steady growth of the American economy. And by implication, other growing economies. If you haven’t got skin in the game, you’re on the sidelines. A dry book unless you have an intellectual interest in investment, it is nevertheless extremely thought-provoking and enlightening. It’s been through several editions and is routinely updated to reflect the latest developments such as exchange-traded funds, the phenomenon of the millennium.
"Stocks for the Long Run" offers solid strategies for long-term investment success, showing investors how to understand and interpret the movements of the market over time. The book provides a detailed description of market performance since 1802 and an examination of the economic, political and fiscal changes that affect the stock market. It also contains an analysis of long-term stock opportunities in foreign markets.
I am a professor of political science with a focus on strategic studies and the causes of war, and before that, I was an operations officer at an army engineering regiment during the Cold War, and before that I was an adolescent wargamer obsessively applying math to sociological problems, and before that an enthusiast of military history. I have had the generosity of providence to conduct research in and on Pakistan’s military for over ten years, as well in Indonesia, Bangladesh, and Egypt. These are the books I think every scholar of strategic studies should start with, as they provide an inspirational and the most direct path to strategic insight.
Dupuy & Dupuy’s Encyclopedia of Military History is the historical bedrock of strategic studies. Despite its name, it is not so much an encyclopedia, as a readable chronological account of world history. It is integrated with insightful commentary on technology, tactics, leadership, and society, presented at the beginning of each chapter, and within sections dedicated to specific battles and wars. Although Wikipedia now exceeds it in the detail of the events and the background of the conflicts covered, Wikipedia lacks a roadmap or the careful examination of the cumulative historical changes that underpin warfare. I assign this fourteen hundred-page text as the primary text in my introduction to strategic studies course.
