Turn Your Eyes Toward Texas: Pioneers Sam and Mary Maverick

From Sam Maverick’s arrival in Texas to his death in 1870, he participated in many of the most momentous events of the state’s early history, including the Siege of Bexar and the defense of the Alamo. He accumulated a fabled land empire and inspired the term “maverick” to denote an unbranded calf or an independent person. Sam’s wife, Mary—by some accounts the first AngloAmerican woman to settle in San Antonio—lived through the stresses and tragedies of pioneer family life, chronicling them ...