Remember Sunday Eiselt from our 2017 profile of her? She’s a former Marine, archaeologist, professor, and director of SMU’s Archaeological Research Collections (ARC). She’s also our best chance of saving some of North Texas’ oldest, most important history.

Last week I met up with her to tour the ARC facilities, located in Heroy Hall. It’s been a little over two years since our initial interview, and in that amount of time she’s managed an amazing transformation of the three rooms that comprise ARC. What follows is an update, including before-and-after photos. But prior to getting there, give the photo above a look. That’s Eiselt in one of the rooms surrounded by musty brown boxes, each packed to capacity with artifacts, stacked like sardines on shelving on the verge of collapse. In the span of two years a great deal has changed, and she says there are more developments on the way.

One of the most valuable fashion collections in the nation is housed inside a dusty orange building in Denton, next to the counseling office at the University of North Texas. The structure is little more than 4,500 square feet of concrete and cold air, but its cultural cachet is irreplaceable. The Texas Fashion Collection contains everything from 18th-century coats to modern-day Alexander McQueen dresses, maternity gear to streetwear, couture treasures to home-ec experiments. There are bridal gowns, lingerie, and ceremonial ensembles from indigenous cultures. Accessories include nearly 1,400 pairs of shoes, 2,500 hats, and 750 handbags. Altogether, there are almost 20,000 pieces.

The trove of designer labels includes 387 designs by Hubert Givenchy, 301 by Oscar de la Renta, 151 from the House of Dior, and an impressive 340 by Cristobal Balenciaga. It is believed to be the largest holding of the designer’s work in the world aside from Balenciaga’s own archive.

The seeds of the collection were planted by the Marcus brothers—Stanley, Edward, Lawrence, and Herbert Jr.—who began gathering 20th-century styles, some say, in the late 1930s. They named it in honor of their aunt, Carrie Marcus Neiman, upon her death in 1953. She co-founded Neiman Marcus with their father and had donated pieces from her wardrobe. The brothers made a point of keeping the collection in Dallas, though offers came to take it east. It eventually was put in the care of the Dallas Fashion Group, which bestowed what was then a few thousand garments to UNT’s fashion design program in 1972 to serve as a resource for its students. It has since become a resource for artists, authors, and curators near and far.

Vogue’s Hamish Bowles has visited. So has Akiko Fukai, curator of Japan’s famed Kyoto Costume Institute. André Leon Talley borrowed pieces when he was putting together the posthumous Oscar de la Renta exhibition, as did the Kimbell Art Museum for last year’s blockbuster “Balenciaga in Black.” The Dallas Embroidery Guild recently took a tour, and designers from Dickies stopped by to study denim styles over the decades. Last year, about 3,500 people accessed the collection for one reason or another.

Historical images of politics, social activism, and community organizing help illuminate the ways in which the Latino community strives to make Dallas a better city with each passing decade. Dallas Public Library’s Dallas History and Archives Division has photos depicting numerous aspects of Latino life in Dallas spanning generations, many of which are available to view in the library’s online catalog.

See how Latino Dallasites played roles in larger historical events. Learn more about Dallas neighborhoods such as Little Mexico, Los Altos, Eagle Ford, and others. View images of local businesses and everyday life such as weddings, students at area schools, churches and religious services, and more.  You might discover a photo of someone you know from the past, whether it’s a friend, relative, or even yourself at a younger age.

For our October issue, contributor Dalila Thomas takes us on a tour of some of Dallas’ best soul food restaurants, from Styrofoam joints to white-tablecloth establishments. There’s fried chicken and waffles, barbecue and biscuits—even vegan Salisbury steak. But in spite of the variety, it all shares a complicated history.

In the American South (and North), slave owners controlled food supplies. According to Adrian Miller, the James Beard Award-winning author of Soul Food: The Surprising Story of an American Cuisine, One Plate at a Time, most enslaved African-Americans received weekly rations consisting of an inexpensive starch (cornmeal, rice, or sweet potatoes); a modest amount of dried, salted, or smoked meat; and a jug of molasses. It was up to the enslaved to supplement their diets by growing their own vegetables (some with seeds, like okra, brought with them from Africa), foraging for wild greens, hunting, and fishing.

After the Civil War, black church gatherings became a place for celebration, with decadent foods like fried chicken and fish, buttery cakes, and pies sweetened with refined sugar. Daily meals weren’t that different than those of slavery—heavy on vegetables, light on meat, and subsidized with starch. Sharecropping meant that many poor tenants were forced to maximize commodity crops in order to pay the rent, leaving little room for gardening for personal consumption.

In search of a better life, millions of Southern blacks headed north as part of “The Great Migration.” Cooking foods from home was a way to build community. But in many urban cities, conditions were cramped. It was often easier and cheaper to eat out than cook at home. Restaurants started meeting the need, and the term soul food was applied as a point of identity and pride in the 1960s, even though it had been coined several decades earlier with the advent of jazz.

Now, soul food is morphing once again. Farm-to-table trends mean seasonal vegetables and heritage animals are being emphasized alongside traditional techniques. And vegan and vegetarian versions are coming to the forefront. It may seem at first like an oxymoron, but vegan soul food may be the truest version of the cuisine. It is a reminder that soul food came from humble and limited ingredients, which were ingeniously repurposed not only for survival but also as a means of cultural expression. And that there wasn’t always bacon grease to fry with.

Standing in the parking lot that is 2016 Commerce Street on a hot August morning, nothing suggests this was once the site of arguably the city’s most popular post-WWII restaurant. Just two blocks east of the renovated Statler hotel, the parking lot was occupied by a building that housed the Goodyear Tire Company (1913), Dixie Mold & Rubber Vulcanizers (1920), and Smoot’s Supplies, a Depression-era business owned by Sheriff “Smoot” Schmid. By the mid-1940s it was known as the Dallas Bible Institute, an interdenominational seminary founded by Dr. Robert J. Wells.

Today its neighbors are the Guns and Roses Boutique, the Dallas Municipal Court building, and a concrete parking garage. But 75 years ago, the spot was central to everything. The trolley, with its overhead electric lines, looped through downtown and the popular Theater District, then out to the suburbs called University Park, East Dallas, and Oak Cliff. This history is gone, but if you squint really hard, you can almost see it.

It is 1947. The second World War has ended, and GIs return to a Dallas that is expanding outward, building new neighborhoods beyond the ends of the trolley tracks that feed downtown. Love Field, with at least dozens of flights daily, brings Hollywood legends to town to perform, play, shop. It is midcentury, and the keyword is “modern.” No longer constrained by wartime rationing, housewives throw off their homemade, post-Depression clothing, draping themselves in the silk, taffeta, and chiffon dresses now available “ready made” at Neiman’s, Sanger Harris, or Titche’s. Friends congregate over dinner at trendy restaurants, followed by dancing at clubs. And the place to eat in 1947? The Town and Country, at 2016 Commerce Street.

If you have been watching Ken Burns’ Country Music on PBS, then maybe, like me, you’ve found your ears pricking up every time Dallas or someone from Dallas enters the narrative. Burns doesn’t spend too much time focusing directly on Dallas or this city’s contribution to the history of country music, but the city appears so often as an aside that it feels like the documentary filmmaker is missing a storyline.

My favorite example is when the film talks about Decca Records’ desire in the 1950s to move all of their country music recording activity to Dallas. At the time, Dallas was challenging Nashville’s place as country music’s hub–this city even had its own version of the Grand Ole Opry, the Big D Jamboree. The Dallas threat prompted Owen Bradley to expand his studio in Nashville in an effort to keep the business. It worked, of course, Bradley’s Quonset Hut Studio became pivotal in establishing the Nashville sound. So, you’re welcome, Nashville.

There are a lot of stories like this one, and they offer more evidence–as I have been arguing lately–that Dallas’ role in the development of American music is both significant and overlooked. Over at the Oak Cliff Advocate, Rachel Stone has taken the time to gather a litany of connections that trace the story of country music through this city. If you love music and care about this city’s history, the piece is well worth your time.

UPDATE: After posting, I came across this Wilonsky joint from 2015 about Jim Beck’s studio next to the Forest Theater, where Lefty Frizzell, Ray Price, Jim Reeves, Hank Thompson, Marty Robbins, and possible Fats Domino, Buddy Holly and Roy Orbison all recorded. The article explores how Beck’s premature death in 1956 impacted Dallas’ efforts to become as a powerhouse in the country music recording industry. A taste: