One little fine-print headline caught my eye:  History Lovers Wanted, it said.  

A “Remembering the Alamo” Job for a summer job was a FORGETTABLE EXPERIENCE EXCEPT for one event that made my whole summer.

I went to the interview, which turned out to be at a place called the “,Remember The Alamo Theatr”e, across Alamo Plaza from the real deal.  The guy who interviewed me was "the boss" in spite of being a year younger than I.  He had a cheesy porn mustache and a sleazy, smarmy way.  And I knew the guy was a liar, because when he found out I had gone to Lee High School, he told me his brother had played on the state championship football team of just a few seasons earlier.  He gave me the name and I feigned vague recognition.  I knew everybody, or knew of them, on that roster.  This guy was a liar and BSer but I accepted the job to shill for the "24-minute-long multi-media presentation that gives visitors all the necessary background to appreciate their visit to the Alamo."

I can't remember if I started the next day or not.  But we, the hosts and hostesses, had to wear jeans and the short-sleeved shirts and cowboy hats they provided.  We received minimum wage, maybe $2.25 per hour.  Thirty minutes for lunch and one 15-minute break per morning and afternoon.   I was used to playing tennis in the heat of the day but standing around on flagstones always, always seemed a lot hotter.  And I didn't wear jeans for tennis.

Three or four of us, the summer kids from college, rotated around the Alamo's perimeter, pestering folks as they approached The Shrine of Texas Liberty.  We had little handbills and the spiel.  To me, the theatre was expensive -- $3.50 for adults -- and unnecessary.  The Alamo, itself, is free.  Many of the tourists came from foreign countries but a great number of them were Texans, often on their first visit to The Alamo.  But almost all visitors knew the background essentials.

Talking to people was fun for me, and I was a soft sell guy who frequently told people that if they knew the background on the battle, they did not need the theatre.  It was scorching every day, with relentless sun and 95-degrees and dry-cleaner-style gusts of wind.

You could get pretty bored during mid-day lulls, waiting for the quarter-hour to cool off with a Dr Pepper back at the office.

Little did I know that the owner of the theatre, a largely absentee New Yorker, sent out spies to sometimes see just how well we did our jobs.  One morning I asked the whereabouts of Jill, a Trinity student.  I was informed she'd been fired the previous day.  She was sitting in the shade in back of the Alamo, her spot for that shift, and did not get up to offer a handbill or sales pitch to one of the spies.

About the only really lively happening that summer was something pretty damn big.  Me and my Dr Pepper habit caused me to miss the hubbub.  I came out to replace one of my cohorts around 3 pm one steamy June day, after ten whole minutes of allowed break-time.  The girl, I can't remember her name, was raving like crazy, with a huge, wild smile and big excitement in her voice.  

Professor Larry Carlson continues to celebrate Longhorn sport (especially football) with a Childlike wonderment. His articles are full of passion, and his resume’ salutes his accomplishments.

Larry Carlson was a radio broadcaster on CBS Radio Sports, NBC Radio Sports, Associated Press Radio, KNBT-FM, and KSPL-AM. He was editor for the San Antonio/South Texas Football Magazine. Many readers will remember Larry as the Sports Director and Host for the Longhorn Locker Room Show on KVET in Austin.

After a serious accident that changed his career path, he joined Texas State as a journalism professor. After three decades of influencing young minds, he retired in 2019.

Individuals who have built the Longhorn Brand while playing for Texas and through personal connections after graduation

A....Always, B... Be, C... Closing.

Always- All gas, no brakes.

Always be building the Longhorn Brand.

The Oral History of Longhorn Sports as told Through the eyes of Texas Larry Carlson is chronicled below.

Subjects discussed:

Lance, Taylor, Randy McEachern, Russell Erxleben, Kevin Currin, Cliff Gustafson, Steve Denton, Eddie Sutton, Abe Lemons, Brad Shearer, Johnny Johnson, Mark McBath, Jon Aune, Steve Denton, tennis, basketball

Football: 1961 Texas-TCU, 2008 Texas Tech and Texas, Big Shoot-out, 1977 Texas Notre Dame, 1963 Baylor-Texas game.

Larry Carlson’s Bio.

I kinda lived the dream in the summer of '78 when I got to go on the nine-stops-in-ten-days SWC Media Tour.  As a San Antonio boy, I had grown up idolizing Dan Cook...even did a pretty fair impression of his TV voice.  About two days into the tour, I (freshly turned 25) mustered some courage to talk to him.

He was great, and very funny.

But what sealed it was this:  They had a Media Tour tennis tourney that was taken quite seriously back in the tennis heyday.  Cook, Dave Campbell and Bill Morgan and others played all the time.

Well, I was a high school player at ol' Robert E Lee...all I could hit was junk and lobs...no pace at all but kind of a human backboard.  That was enough to beat lots of impatient players who had much better form.

Dave was the multi-year reigning champ and I beat him in the semis and then won in the finals.

Cook sat in the umpire's chair at Rice and actually called lines.

After that, they all called me "Bjorn," (even though I was a Connors fan) and I drank with 'em every night.

Whenever Cook and Morgan would come to Austin that fall, they'd get me to meet 'em at Lakeway (!) to play tennis and have a drink.  Top o' the world.

Larry Carlson was born and raised in San Antonio. Tutored by his father, a UT grad, he became an ardent Longhorn football fan and dreamed of someday covering burnt orange sports.

He attended Southwest Texas State University in an attempt to play varsity tennis but was sidelined by knee injuries as a freshman. He later received a bachelor's degree in journalism and a master's degree in Educational Administration from SWT.

Carlson got his great break just one year out of college and became sports director at Austin's KVET Radio, doing multiple sportscasts daily and hosting the Fred Akers pre-game show and post-game Longhorn Locker Room Show. Larry also was a sportscaster who wrote for James Street's Orange Power...

He later worked as the first sports information director at The University of Texas at San Antonio and then became Texas Hill Country View magazine editor. All told, his professional experience includes broadcasting, writing, producing, and consulting.

Larry began teaching at Southwest Texas -- later to become Texas State University -- in 1984 and taught more than a dozen courses before settling into his niche, news, and sports in broadcast journalism. Carlson was cited for excellence in teaching, was named "Outstanding Teacher" in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication, and received the Mitte Honor Program Distinguished Educator award. He also was selected to travel to Berlin with RIAS (Radio In the American Sector) in 2009 to interview newsmakers during the thirtieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.

In addition to teaching, Carlson served as co-creator and executive producer of Big Game Hunters, a sports/travel/tailgating series that aired on ESPN2, and from 2007-2012 co-hosted Longhorn Pipeline on San Antonio's ESPN Radio affiliate.

Larry enjoys traveling to favorite beaches in Florida and along the Eastern seaboard plus Williamsburg, Virginia, and other historic sites. His hobbies include writing articles on the TLSN Longhorn website, backyard grilling, and reading about Texas History and American History. His favorite historical figure is George Washington.

In retirement, Larry is writing exclusive articles for the TLSN website. His email address is

mail: lc13@txstate.edu
 

Professor Larry Carlson’s combination bio and Interview

I feel like I'm the luckiest, most fortunate, most blessed person in the world.  I mean it.  I was born and raised in San Antonio...I always refer to it as "The World's Greatest City."  My parents were the greatest, and so were my older sisters.  One, Diana, is still here, and we get together every week to eat Mexican food and laugh.

I had a pretty much idyllic boyhood in middle America.  Lived for Little League baseball, and Daddy was my coach.  Thanks to my father's influence, I became the world's most ardent Longhorn football fan. Later, I went to the number one high school in the state, Robert E Lee High, and got to play varsity tennis for a damn good team and cheer on my friends who were on kickass football, basketball, and baseball teams.  The girls were the prettiest, the academics were the best, and people worked and prepared well to succeed in all areas.  It all set me on a good path.

College at SWT was fun.  I went there to try to play tennis but tore up a knee --- for what seemed to be the hundredth time -- my first semester.  I later thought about transferring to Texas, my dream school.  Daddy was a '47 UT grad, and he and Mom raised us as big Longhorn fans.  We went to three football games per season and were devoted fans.  Anyway, I stayed at SWT because a guy named Sean McCleneghan had come in and started broadcast journalism.  He was and is a dynamo, he encouraged me, and I had some success...and he set me up to get my first play-by-play radio gig while still in college, then great jobs once I graduated.

Professor Carlson’s interview

 first the basics

Larry was born and raised in San Antonio.  Later lived and worked in Austin and San Marcos....have been back in SA for thirty years.  My wife and I live in a 1950s house that is half a mile from the 1960 house my family moved into when I was seven.  My parents had that home for almost a half-century.  I'm right there in my young stomping grounds.  Memories that make me laugh on every corner. College:  SWT (now Texas State)  

Best jobs ever:  One year out of college, I got my dream job after my first job in broadcast news. I was sports director at Austin's number one radio station, KVET, and hosted the post-game Longhorn Locker Room Show after all UT football games.   Anchoring news two hours a day, then going to football practice and doing three sportscasts each afternoon.  Livin' the dream.

TlSN- How did you meet Kirk Bohls?

It was the spring of '77, and I had been reading Kirk's work in the Statesman for three-four years.  I was in my first radio job, and my mentor, Sean McCleneghan, told me he had hired Kirk to teach a reporting class on the side at SWT.  I wanted to meet him, so Sean asked me to join them for iced tea at a place in San Marcos.  Turned out Kirk was only a few years older than me, and I peppered him with questions about Longhorn football for two hours.  He was just the nicest, wittiest guy.

Six months later, in August, I got the job at KVET Radio and was going to football practice every day.

I started running into Kirk, and we were instant friends.  Besides the obvious football interest, we liked the same music, laughed at the same things, played tennis...just became great friends, so that's been going on now for more than 45 years.  Kirk and I played tennis every week that we could...we used to play against Coach Akers and his tennis partner.  Akers was a terrific athlete, player, and burning competitor, but they never beat us.  Nobody is more quietly ferocious than Kirk. The guy played half of a high school football game with a broken neck!  We started playing in a three-day Fourth of July tennis tournament, that we ended up playing in together in doubles for more than twenty straight years.  I quickly got to just be part of the family and loved his parents, his brothers, his aunt and his uncle. I've been friends with his wife, Vicki, and his brother, Rod (one of three brothers) all that time.  Just the greatest Texas family.

So it wasn't really surprising that Kirk, in 1984, told me about a teaching job at SWT and recommended me to them.  Sean had long moved on to become Journalism Chair at other universities, so I didn't have him to rubber stamp me for the job.  But Kirk's word sold 'em, and I was an alumnus.  It IS who you know.

Everyone always hears that saying that "the Lord works in mysterious ways."  That was certainly true for me.  I was soon on the cusp of the best times of my life.  After some dark clouds had rained on my outlook, it all got sunny again when I ended up with the opportunity to teach broadcast journalism at SWT.

I was reinvented in a new profession that borrowed from my past, and I was back to being the happiest person in the world. 

TLSN - What did you teach?

I taught 12 different courses in my first decade before I completely focused on broadcast news and sports, plus supervising the students doing our radio station's news and sports on the air.  Many years ago, one of our directors of The School of Journalism and Mass Communication once thought he was commending me for my versatility ....he wasn't a sports guy, but he tried to use an old baseball term and said I was the department's utility infielder.  I corrected him and said, "I believe MVP would be the right term." 

Anyway, I mostly taught small writing classes of 14-18 people and it was a blast.  I knew everyone's hometown and high school, their goals and dreams and they knew me.  I had fun every day, even when I sometimes thought I was rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic when students repeated the same mistakes.

But the great students made it especially worthwhile.

 TLSN- Any other jobs you care to mention on your resume?

For a week one summer during college days. My Dad hired my best buddy and me to paint some big oil tanks with that silver paint that prevents evaporation from those silos.  It was down there in South Texas near Yorktown and Goliad.  It was hard enough work and hot as hell up on top of those tanks, but we had an ice chest of Big Red and Dr. Pepper and we had a radio blaring out there with nobody but us and some cattle.  We cracked each other up all day each day, then Daddy would take us out to the only place open in Yorktown for supper.  We would each drink a gallon of iced tea and put on the feedbag for chicken fried steaks AND enchiladas.  Big fun.  

 TLSN- What are your favorite pastimes

Reading about history, especially the American Revolution, Texas history, and the West.  And I get the Wall Street Journal delivered to the front yard every day.  It's like a daily Christmas package to open.

Favorite authors/writers?  Washington Irving,  Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Larry McMurtry, my great friend Kirk Bohls and many columnists from the WSJ.

Any book recommendations?  Well, all the original Sherlock Holmes mysteries, Irving's "Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle," plus a terrific book my wife discovered, "A Gentleman In Moscow" by Amor Towles.  

My wife and I love to travel and just relax in the backyard by the pool.  Another pastime is just listening to good music at home and in my car.

And, of course, I love college football.  I think about it 52 weeks a year.  Always have.   

 Who are some of your favorite Longhorn players?

Steve Worster, Jimmy Saxton, Scott Appleton, Ernie Koy, Pete Lammons, Linus Baer, James Street, Rosy Leaks, Wade Johnston, Kiki DeAyala, Peter Gardere, Tony Brackens, Major Applewhite, Colt McCoy...those would be just a few.

An all-time favorite: Worster, for sure.  He was unbelievable.  And Linus Baer in high school...he was a senior at Lee when I was a fifth-grader.  He got hurt in an all-star game before his freshman year at UT and was primarily a blocking back for Chris Gilbert at Texas.  He was a captain and a great player.

 TLSN- Where do you like to vacation?

Plenty of places in Texas, but Florida --- anywhere and everywhere in Florida -- has become destination numero uno every year.  Love the mid-Atlantic, the area of North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware.  Sensational settings and just unmatched history.

Bottom line:  I love the Atlantic Ocean, from Florida to Maine.  The Atlantic is my muse.  Haha.

 TLSN- favorite places in Texas?

San Antonio, my home, is obviously my favorite place.  It's the greatest.

But other places I love, and there are many, would include El Paso, Galveston, Balmorhea, Alpine, Jefferson. the Palo Duro Canyon area and Port A of the past...or whenever you can catch a sunny, hot day without the crowds that swarm there now.

Crowds have spoiled the whole I-35 corridor north of San Antonio all the way to Dallas. It's a blow to the spirit.  We need a wall built around California.

 TLSN: who are your biggest influences in life, work, etc.”

 Well, my parents.  I'm in awe of people like them, Texans and Americans, who toughed out the Great Depression and World War II and were just so selfless in the way they went about everything.  I know I haven't done a damn thing compared to them.  The whole "Greatest Generation" title is no exaggeration, in my opinion.  And the Founding Fathers were the smartest people who ever assembled.

But my sisters also have been positive influences and my wife is a great, positive force and makes my world go around.  She's whip-smart and beautiful and the most competitive person in the world.  My friends have been stellar and a great source of inspiration.  I've been tight with a core group of friends for 35-50 years and counting.  In particular, Kirk Bohls really landed me my teaching job that I stayed with for thirty-five years.  Tom Swan has given me more good advice and made me laugh more than anyone. Sean McCleneghan, my mentor and former professor and still a wonderful friend.  And this sounds corny, but I would list my old high school, Robert E Lee in San Antonio, as a strong influence.  People my age dreamed of going there, couldn't wait for our time and then accomplished a great deal and learned a lot of life lessons that still stick, I think.  We were at the right place at the right time, for sure.

TLSN- You spoke of an appreciation for history.  Do you have your own "Mount Rushmore" of historical figures?

George Washington tops everyone and my wife and I just took our umpteenth pilgrimage to Mount Vernon.  I continue to read and collect more new and old books on Washington.  Others would be Benjamin Franklin, Davy Crockett and, not surprisingly, Robert E. Lee.  Those are my absolute favorites I would love to interview but there are plenty, from every era.  By the way, I love studying geography, too, and it goes well with history.  

TLSN-What's on your musical playlist? 

Really a pretty crazy mix.  Oldies from the days of my youth plus plenty of '80s. old school country, Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett and Jack Jones.  And most of the new stuff I keep up with would be classified as indie, electronic and trance.  Favorite indie artist is Grimes.  I love her ethereal sound.  I punch around a lot of buttons on the tunes...no patience for a bad song or ones I already heard a million times and no longer like.  I'm not patient at all with that. There is some music that I wouldn’t want to be trapped with. Like that old bumper sticker said, "You Can't Spell Crap Without Rap."  And I can't stomach any James Taylor or any sad sack stuff.

 TLSN-What were your favorite inventions after College?

....I used to tell my students that my three favorite inventions since I got out of college were the satellite radio, Diet Coke and Thursday Night College Football on ESPN.  I get a big ol' 44-ounce Diet Coke first thing in the morning and at least another one later.  And having Sirius/XM to listen to in the car and on the phone is good, easy, varied entertainment.  And I always love firing up the barbecue pit, pouring a drink, and getting fired up for something like Memphis at East Carolina or Vanderbilt at Virginia Tech.  Man, I love watching those Thursday-night college games.  Love it!

TLSN: What do most people NOT know about Larry Carlson? 

Well...I have grilled supper about 100 nights a year in each of the past 25 years.  Always over charcoal.

I'm an Honorary Lieutenant Colonel Aide-de-camp for the Alabama State Militia.

And I once asked Chrissie Evert, the world's number one women's tennis player, for a date. 

TLSN- You were in a severe car accident that pushed you out of broadcasting for years. From the webmaster’s point of view, your recovery from that ordeal defines your spirit and character. Could you share with the readers the story about the obstacles you overcame to get your life back?

  It was in that car that a drunk driver hit me head-on (I was northbound on I-35 near Slaughter Lane exit)....back then, it was just oleander bushes as a divider between northbound and southbound.  I never even saw him.  I can remember trying to talk to EMS, but I'm sure I was in shock.  Woke up about three days later in Brackenridge Hospital.

Well...I knew I was fortunate and that God had spared me.  Anyway, I miraculously survived.  Had a broken right femur (still have 13 screws in there....excellent job by Dr. Carey Windler, who would be a UT team surgeon for many years), a broken jaw, a broken nose, broken face, broken ribs, AND a paralyzed vocal cord. Dealing with a busted jaw was no fun.  But as a San Antonio boy, I was nourished by blended-up refried beans, cheese, and Picante sauce through a big syringe-like contraption that I could get between my uppers and lowers.  Soups and milkshakes weren't making it.

The toughest obstacle was not being able to talk loud enough for anyone to hear.  I had always been a talker.  When I was little, my older cousins from San Saba would give me a nickel to shut up for five minutes.  As a teen and young adult, my gang of seven buddies...we were all glib, all jolly smartasses, trying to get the next good wisecrack in to make everyone laugh.  Suddenly, with no voice, I could do nothing but listen.  A humbling experience.  

My friends and family were visiting me all time...I had to move back in with my parents for six months while trying to recuperate.  Everyone visited on a daily basis, but sometimes I just wanted to somehow drift out to far West Texas and be part of the silence and not have to try to respond.  Even one-on-one in a quiet room, it was hard for me to be heard.  And since I was on crutches, I would ponder going to Jack-in-the-Box for a Coke.  But I couldn't use the drive-thru because nobody could hear me.  I felt frustrated on stupid stuff like that, all the while, counting my obvious blessings.

I could only whisper (barely discernible in a QUIET room) for eight months...docs thought my voice would come back...it didn't.  So I was sent to the top doc at Cleveland Clinic. Success!  Neck was stitched up like Frankenstein and a very scratchy voice that was a miracle, though not loud. The people at Cleveland Clinic, Dr. Harvey Tucker in particular, were medical magicians to restore a somewhat workable voice for me.  I knew then that I could get through whatever.  Eight months later, when the doctors at the Cleveland Clinic restored a workable voice for me, I knew then I could figure out a new career.  And at least now, I could again be heard in one-on-one chats. Once I got a second vocal cord surgery two years later, things were much better. Huge breakthrough.  

 I had another year before I was cleared to work...and it would have to be in some new field.  My voice was very raspy, and I didn't have enough breath control to talk in more than semi-short bursts.  I decided I had time to write something I had always put off.

I wrote an 80-page history of my alma mater's (Robert E Lee High) glory days in football and got it published in a magazine.  Got the Lee Booster Club to sell it, and I donated one-third of the money back to them.

It sold well and provided a good dose of satisfaction and a sense of accomplishment that I had missed. Then I got hired for sports information at UTSA.

Was cleared to work after 20 months and immediately became UTSA's first sports info director in 1981 when they began with basketball, track, CC, and tennis.   Two years later, I took the job as editor/co-publisher of a feature mag called Texas Hill Country View.

But I still -- for another three years or so -- would be sitting at a stop light and feel sorry for myself...wondering why that accident happened.  I would flash back to the date -- November 29, 1979 -- at some point each day.  Always before, things felt good and I was used to being the happiest guy in the world.  My life was different and I was struggling to adjust, I guess, at least under the surface.  

  Almost instantly, within a month, I got that job teaching at my college alma mater, SWT, I was re-invented.  I was born for teaching, the way I had felt that I was born to be a sportscaster.  Happy, happy, joy, joy.  Still getting to visit friends and family back in San Antonio but making lots of new friends, too, living in San Marcos.  And some girls liked my raspy voice.  It was like a signature trademark and some people thought it was WHY I had been a broadcaster.  Unbelievable.  And I noticed sometime in that first year of teaching, that I was no longer thinking about 1979 and wondering.  Everything was new again. 

I was on a one-year contract, so I had to reapply the next summer and "make the team" again.  Did that three straight years and then they told me I would need to get a master's degree while I continued to teach.

So I did that.  Stayed there more than three decades.  Had fun every day. 

Much as I liked the teaching work, I always liked time off even better.  Now, retired, it's like an endless summer of seven-day weekends.  I'm the luckiest guy on the planet.