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Essays

D Magazine’s 50 Greatest Stories: An Argument For Moving Back In With Mom

Matt Goodman
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Just a few reasons why you might consider moving back in with your elderly mother. illustration by PJ Loughran

In 2011, Nancy Nichols, then D Magazine’s dining critic, got personal in our pages. Newly single and the proud owner of 2.5 pounds of Costco almonds, Nancy decided to move in with her mother. She sold her home near Bachman Creek and settled into her mom’s near Preston Center, which they soon began calling Grey Gardens. Big and Little Edie, scaring family members with Christmas gifts of old pill bottles and pantyhose, watching TV, sipping gin and tonics, sharing dog walking duties, putting Netflix DVDs back in their sleeves. (Remember that?)

“You Can Go Home Again” is one of the 50 greatest stories that has run in this magazine. It’s one of those beautiful essays that are never more perfect as when they are published in a magazine, a chance to reflect on your own life and family as you learn about someone else’s, tears and laughter and all. I don’t want to spoil it, so I’ll leave you to it. I need to go call my mom.

Local News

The Oldest Park in Dallas Has an Uncertain Future

Bethany Erickson
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One of the historic structures housed at Old City Park, in the Cedars. via Facebook

At the end of May, the city’s Parks and Recreation Department will temporarily take over operations of Old City Park. The park, the oldest in the city’s history, has been managed by the Dallas County Heritage Society since 1967.

The park was purchased in 1876 for $600 (about $22,000 in 2024). Over time, it has become a repository that offers a glimpse into the region’s history. Over the past 40 years, the park has received Victorian homes and other historic buildings from the Cedars neighborhood, Plano, Carrollton, and the area that is now the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport. 

The 20-acre park has one of the state’s most extensive collections of 19th-century pioneer and Victorian homes. About the time the Dallas County Heritage Society took over operations in the 60s, the park became known as Dallas Heritage Village. Serving as a living history museum, it charged admission until recently.

“This model served Dallas well for many years, but as attendance fell and the organization ran unsustainable operating deficits for 10+ years, it became very clear that changes were needed,” interim park CEO Michael Meadows said in a lengthy update on Facebook in November. “So, last year, the Dallas County Heritage Society, the organization that currently manages Old City Park, made the decision to change the name back to ‘Old City Park’ and to transition from serving as a living history museum into a public park that celebrates Dallas history.”

Meadows said the park is now free to visit, and DCHS staff has added a “much wider array” of programming to attract visitors. The city says more than 31,000 people visited the park last year.

However, the condition of the park’s 22 structures and their continued maintenance may be a sticking point in any master plan.

Dallas Judge Stuffs Her Docket to Make a Statement. Judge Amber Givens assigned her court over 119 jury trials in a single day, on April 1. The thinking is that doing so will encourage plea deals or a quicker trial, but most defense attorneys are furious and the district attorney says his prosecutors will have no way to prepare for such a workload. The Dallas Morning News reports that both sides have to prepare as if the court would hear these cases, despite the likelihood that the week will see just two trials.

Construction Begins on Opal Lee’s Childhood Home. The grandmother of Juneteenth hasn’t lived in that Fort Worth home since a mob of White racists burned it down in 1930. On Thursday, Trinity Habitat, HistoryMaker Homes, and Texas Capital Bank broke ground on a new home on the same plot, where the 97-year-old will live after it is completed.

Richardson ISD Votes to Close 5 Schools. The district is trying to solve a budget deficit exacerbated by the fact that the state of Texas hasn’t adjusted its funding per student in many years. Closing Greenwood Hills, Springdale, Spring Valley, Thurgood Marshall, and Dobie will save the district about $11 million. The board voted 7-0 in favor of the closures, despite the heckling from parents in the audience.

Biden’s Visit to Dallas Proves Fruitful. ICYMI, President Joe Biden is in town (he’ll be wheels up for Houston soon, though). He attended two private fundraisers last night that organizers tell D Magazine netted more than $3 million. He also cracked this joke about Trump and endorsed Colin Allred for senator. Among the attendees was former Nikki Haley voter Mark Cuban, state senators Royce West and Nathan Johnson, and Dallas County Commissioner Elba Garcia.

Jenkins Now Dad of Twins. County Judge Clay Lewis Jenkins, 59, and his wife Ramsey welcomed twins Wednesday morning. He was reportedly on hand to welcome Biden at the airport, but then went back to the hospital. He also has a teen daughter from his first marriage.

Don’t Go in the Water. The aftermath of Plano’s 1.5 million-gallon raw sewage spill into White Rock Lake continues. Dallas Park and Recreation officials have suspended water-related activities at the lake because of elevated bacteria levels. Fishing, rowing, yachting, and other boating activities are suspended during the suspension.

Four Local Nonprofits Receive Funds from MacKenzie Scott. Yesterday, philanthropist MacKenzie Scott gave roughly $7 million to four local nonprofits. Bonton Farms, the Prison Entrepreneurship Program, and the Epilepsy Foundation of Texas each received $2 million, and Dallas Afterschool received $1 million.

Grab the Umbrella. Showers and thunderstorms are likely by mid-morning, the National Weather Service’s Fort Worth office says. That rain will linger through tonight, and we’re expected to get at least half an inch of rain.

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Local News

How President Biden’s Dallas Visit Might Mess Up Your Commute

Bethany Erickson
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President Joe Biden leaves Phoenix for North Texas this afternoon, and will arrive in Dallas around 5:25 p.m. Joe Rondone/The Republic / USA TODAY NETWORK

President Joe Biden will be in town today for two fundraisers, and there is a good chance that the security around that visit will impact your commute home. How and where he’ll be is a bit of a secret—the Dallas Police Department referred us to the Secret Service, which told us they’re working to “minimize disruptions.”

“For security reasons, we are unable to release specific motorcade routes in advance but the public can expect intermittent road closures and parking restrictions as part of the visit,” a spokesperson said.

However, we’ve got some guesses that may help you plan for your drive home.

Sports News

A Funny Story About D Magazine’s Office Bracket Pool

Tim Rogers
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My daughter was accepted into Purdue's engineering school, so I may have picked them (and Zach Edey) to go further than was strictly smart.

Today I got an email from a woman who reads D Magazine. It made me smile. So I thought I’d share it, because it might make you smile, too:

A friend and I met a Frankie’s last night to do our brackets. We love to gamble on sports! Anyway, after we racked up a $150 tab and had completed our brackets, we gave em to the waitress. I said, “I read in D Magazine that y’all are doing brackets for $10 each.” Well, I was rather surprised (and aghast) when the manager came over with our brackets and said, “We don’t do brackets.” I was ready to kill your magazine (haha)! Got to work this morning and was going to write you a harsh note, and realized that the article I referred to was from 2016! UGH. I am such a dumbass.

Lemme get to the point. I am writing you today hoping you have an idea where we can submit our brackets! Do you know anyplace in town where we can participate? We used to do them at work, but the guy in charge died.

I invited her to join our D Magazine office pool. The guy in charge is still living.

The Ultimate Guide to Dallas Hair

Alice Laussade
By Alice Laussade |
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Elizabeth Lavin

We’re so weird about hair. When it’s attached to your head, people compliment you on it. They ask who combs it for you so they can get their hair combed the same way. They ask you if it’s real. Whether your answer is yes or no, excited follow-up questions abound. Your hairstyle can even be defined as “sexy.” Mmm. Protein filament. So sexual. 

When it’s no longer attached to your head and you find it in your food? Decidedly unsexy. Unsanitary, even. Come across a pile of hair separated from its owner, and you’re at least confused, at most disgusted. Even reading the phrase “pile of hair” may cause some to dry heave. 

And then, of course, there’s how you style your hair. There are bad haircuts; there are good haircuts. Smooth hair is good; frizzy hair is bad. Flyaways must be tamed. And gray hairs are to be avoided at great expense. 

We want our haircut to showcase how individual and unique we are, so we go to Instagram and search “unique, trendy haircut” and bring a photo to our hairstylist because we want to look precisely as individual as the rest of the internet. If the hairstylist doesn’t copy it exactly, or if they do copy it exactly and it looks terrible on us because our face is “bad for curtain bangs,” we cry. A lot.

In this rollicking package of Dallas hair stories, we blow it out with tales about a 90-minute scalp massage you didn’t know you needed, why Kameron Westcott’s hairstylist refused to let her go red, how braids can make a statement, the TV news anchor who shook the airwaves with her updo, a Cowboys Cheerleader who used an orange juice can to tame her locks, and Erykah Badu’s hairstylist taking on the Texas Lege—just to list a few.

Push back those bangs, and click through. It’s the cover story for our March issue.

Giant Pothole Takes Out Cars on Interstate 20. It feels like calling this a pothole doesn’t do it justice. A chunk of concrete was missing and the rebar was exposed, and about a dozen vehicles drove over it and popped their tires. The Dallas County Sheriff’s Office closed the lane, and TxDOT crews seemed to struggle to patch it. The lanes appear to still be closed, so take that into account if you’re heading east on I-20.

TCEQ Investigating White Rock Lake After Spill. The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality is testing the water from the White Rock spillway to Frankford Road after Plano spilled 1.5 million gallons of raw sewage into White Rock Creek. The state will be conducting tests through Friday, but didn’t tell the Morning News what those tests had found so far.

It’s the Second Day of Spring. Expect warm-adjacent weather today, with highs in the 70s and partly sunny skies. Rain returns overnight and will likely linger into your commute tomorrow morning. The stronger storms are expected to be south of Interstate 20.

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It appears that Dallas will be allowed to continue enforcing a curfew on sexually oriented businesses. The U.S. Supreme Court announced Monday that it would not review an appeals court ruling in favor of the city, which cited crime as a reason to shut down the clubs for four hours after 2 a.m.

In 2022, the Dallas City Council voted to place a curfew on sexually oriented businesses, requiring businesses like strip clubs to close at 2 a.m. and not reopen until 6 a.m. That new ordinance immediately sparked a lawsuit from the Association of Club Executives of Dallas—a trade association—an adult novelty store, and four city strip clubs.

A federal judge ruled for the plaintiffs in May 2022, but that decision was overturned by the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in October 2023. Dallas began enforcement of the curfew in November. Lawyers for the businesses requested a SCOTUS review in February.

Businesses that violate the ordinance could lose their licenses, and could face criminal charges that include up to a year in jail or a $4,000 fine.

Local News

Edward Cloutman, Who Argued the Case that Desegregated Dallas ISD, Dies at 78

Bethany Erickson
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Edward Cloutman, who died Friday, and Sylvia Demarest received the Martin Luther King Jr. Justice Award from the Dallas Bar Association in recognition of their work. Pictured left to right, Dallas Bar Association president Bill Mateja, Demarest, Cloutman, and Judge Craig Smith, who introduced the two at the organization’s luncheon that day. Courtesy of the Dallas Bar Association

Edward Cloutman’s name may not be instantly recognized by many in Dallas, but his life’s work has had an impact on most people who have lived here over the last 50 years. Throughout his decades-long career, his fingerprints are on some of the most important local cases you can find, including some that changed the way Dallas was governed and how its school district taught. Cloutman died on Friday at the age of 78. A cause of death has not been announced.

Roger Albright, who worked with Cloutman at the firm Mullinax, Wells, Babb & Cloutman for a decade, said Monday afternoon that he counted Cloutman as both a friend and mentor. “He wasn’t trying to get his name in lights or do this for fame,” he said. “He wasn’t doing it for money. He was doing it because it was the right thing to do. He was absolutely committed to making the world a better place. He was a great lawyer.”

Judge Ken Molberg, who serves on the state’s Fifth District Court of Appeals, called Cloutman a “quiet civil rights hero of Dallas.”

“Perhaps some of you don’t know his name, but you’ve no doubt heard something about his years-long, valiant efforts to desegregate our school system in what’s commonly referred to as the Tasby case,” Molberg wrote, referring to Tasby v. Estes, the 1970 class action lawsuit that ended with a judicial order to integrate the district. “Brilliant and soft-spoken, Ed was a man of character—a long-serving soldier for justice who battled intolerance in all its embodiments.”

Local News

Leading Off (3/19/24)

Tim Rogers
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Plano Pooped on Dallas. A mechanical failure at a water station dumped more than 1.5 million gallons of hell into White Rock Creek. It started Thursday and was fixed Saturday. The Corinthian Sailing Club on White Rock Lake moved its annual regatta to Lake Ray Hubbard over the weekend, but officials yesterday said they are monitoring the waterways and haven’t seen damage to aquatic life.

Tyron Smith Bids Us Adieu. The left tackle played for the Cowboys for 13 years. Now he’s a Jet. He took to Instagram to say, “[P]art of my heart will forever be left in Texas.”

Dallas Finally Has a Monument to Racial Violence. A steel sculpture called Shadow Lines near the Sixth Floor Museum will be formally dedicated next Tuesday. You should read Sharon Grigsby’s story about what the monument signifies.

Local News

Dallas Public Library Introduces Homeless Community Through New Podcast

Bethany Erickson
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The Dallas Public Library's latest podcast, "On the Block," aims to provide a voice for the city's homeless population.

Joy and Kevin met at a homeless shelter in Texarkana. Joy is a registered stockbroker and Kevin is a minister who says he intended to go it alone, but “God had decided to bring Joy into my life—we fell in love.”

The couple assessed their strengths and recently hopped a Greyhound bus for Dallas, spending their first night sleeping outside near The Stewpot.

The two recently sat down with Dallas Public Library staffers to talk about their experiences in a new podcast. Library officials hope it will offer insight into the city’s unhoused population.

“There are a lot of preconceived ideas about people who are experiencing homelessness and why they are in that situation,” said library community relations administrator Melissa Dease. “The podcast is a way to share their stories and hopefully increase understanding and empathy.”

Dease said the new podcast is part of the library’s ongoing homeless engagement initiative, which launched in 2013. Hundreds of members of the city’s homeless community use libraries to access computers and the internet, books, and for a place to escape the heat or cold. The library also offers mentorship and personalized assistance programs.

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