Legendary Locals of Oak Cliff, Texas

Book excerpt: Since its earliest days, Oak Cliff, a rolling, tree-covered section of Dallas, has generated outstanding personalities in all fields of American society and business and continues to do so today. In a high school history class, future US Speaker of the House Jim Wright caught his political vision; two years later, future Olympic champion and LPGA founder Babe Didrikson began her training at Lake Cliff Park. The legendary Stevie Ray Vaughan, along with contemporaries Michael Martin Murphy and Ray Wylie Hubbard, began his music career in Oak Cliff, while sports legends like Jerry Rhome and Harvey Martin paid their dues on local fields of play. Hollywood successes Belita Moreno and Stephen Tobolowsky first trained in their high school drama classes, decades after pioneer Oak Cliff girl Sarah Horton Cockrell became Dallas's first millionaire. Although a presidential assassin once lived in the community, two of America's largest mega-churches now call Oak Cliff home, as did the "Father of the Texas Sesquicentennial."