Formed by conjunctions of railroads, cattle, oil, finance and technology the glassy spires of Dallas rise from the Central Texas plains, surrounded by highways and suburban sprawl. This wealthy city of 1,075,894 (1998 estimate) is also a center for art, education (Baylor, Southern Methodist and Dallas Universities), medicine and religion, especially massive evangelical churches. NeimanMarcus department store, famed for its fabulous Christmas catalog, and computer maker Texas Instruments are also based there. Sports teams include the world champion Cowboys (football) and the Mavericks (basketball); baseball’s Texas Rangers play in adjacent Arlington. The city shares an airport with nearby Fort Worth in a metropolitan area of over 4 million, including fast-growing suburbs like Plano.

The assassination of President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963 and the televised events that followed inscribed Dallas on world consciousness: the sixth-floor museum in the Texas Book Depository commemorates this tragedy. In the 1980s, the city’s image was reshaped by the prime-time soap opera Dallas. The grittier realism of Errol Morris’ documentary Thin Blue Line (1986) and other works recognize the class and racial diversity of the area and its problems.