Thomas Jefferson High School

Miles Hires Five to DISD Administrative Team

A week after making one of his bigger hires in Teach for America's Charles Glover, incoming Dallas Independent School District Superintendent Mike Miles continues to fill out his administrative team. Tuesday, the district announced that it has hired the first five of an eventual 20 executive direct ... More >>

Why Does Dallas Keep Forgetting About its Cheese-Heroin Problem?

On Friday, Dallas police reported that they were investigating the apparent overdose deaths of two students from Thomas Jefferson High School in March and April: 14-year-old Jaime Morales, who was found dead at his home in Northwest Dallas, and an unnamed 17-year-old, found dead in an apartment on F ... More >>

Cheese Heroin Reappears at Thomas Jefferson

"Cheese," the cheap-as-hell mixture of cold medicine and black tar heroin, is again rearing its head at DISD's Thomas Jefferson High School. The school, which was known by students as the Cheesehead Factory, had reportedly done a pretty good job of ridding if from their hallways.Now, another student ... More >>

Mike Nesmith's Farewell to Davy Jones

​By now you're no doubt well aware that Monkees lead singer Davy Jones died today at the age of 66 following a heart attack. His bandmates have each posted their goodbyes: Peter Tork, Micky Dolenz and Mike Nesmith, the Monkee with deep Dallas roots.The Thomas Jefferson High School graduate didn't ... More >>

LGBT Leaders Ask Council to Help Mayor Rawlings Sign That Same-Sex Marriage Pledge

Daniel Cates​The leadership of the Thomas Jefferson High School student council (sniff), guests of Ann Margolin at this morning's meeting of the Dallas City Council, got quite the treat this morning: a parade of public speakers once again thoughtfully, kindly but also forcefully berating Mayor Mik ... More >>

Hey, Hey, It's Mike Nesmith's T.J. Yearbook (And a Concert in London, Recorded in '75)

From Mike Nesmith's T.J. Document in 1961​While we wait for some return calls, and a council meeting, allow me to direct your attention to these two separate but quite related items. First off: A Friend of Unfair Park -- and long-ago Thomas Jefferson High School classmate -- points out that someon ... More >>

Knock, Knock. Who's There? Vanilla Ice, Back Home to Give One Couple's Room a Makeover.

Robbie Van Winkle prepares to ambush a Northwest Dallas couple who entered a DIY Network extreme room makeover contest.​The email said to meet at the Walnut Hill Recreation Center, corner of Midway and Walnut Hill, at 12:15 sharp. "Look for the Rolls-Royce." (A borrowed 2008 Rolls-Royce Phantom Dr ... More >>

Ron Corning Will Save WFAA's Morning Show?

​A few weeks ago, Ed Bark noted that WFAA-Channel 8 was moving Chris Flanagan, co-host of its morning-news show Daybreak, to Good Morning Texas, whatever that is. His replacement: Ron Corning, who's leaving Kabletown's Long Island affiliate to pair up with Cynthia Izaguirre, the sixth-most famous ... More >>

Watch: Beware The Wrath of Meat Loaf...

Meat Loaf!​We already knew that he could barely fit his dick in his pants, but on last night's episode of Celebrity Apprentice, Dallas' Own Meat Loaf -- born Marvin Lee Aday and educated at Thomas Jefferson High School and North Texas State University (now the University of North Texas) -- showed ... More >>

Give Mike Rawlings's Education Plan a Grade

Mike Rawlings's campaignRawlings, bracketed by his son and mother at North Dallas High School yesterday​Forthcoming are Jim's thoughts on the mayoral candidates' forum held last night at Thomas Jefferson High School, which looks like it needs every cent of the $8-mil renovation that's just commenc ... More >>

And Why Do You Want to Be Dallas Mayor?

Sam MertenNo, you're not having a flashback: Ex-Mayor Tom spoke before his would-be replacements took their turns at Thomas Jefferson.​Who says the four Dallas mayoral candidates haven't distinguished themselves from one another? Last night at that forum at Thomas Jefferson High School, the first ... More >>

GOP Hispanics Not Only Group Trying to Keep Okpa From Having His Say in Mayor's Race

It's gonna be hard for Edward Okpa to get much traction in the mayor's race when he's being ignored by The News and several groups sponsoring forums.​Turns out the Dallas Chapter of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly isn't the only organization minimizing the mayoral candidacy of Edward ... More >>

Edward Okpa Not Invited to Mayoral Forum at TJ, But Tom Leppert Nabs Speaking Role

Photo by Patrick MichelsTom Leppert​[Update at 5:50 p.m.: We just heard from Kunkle, who says our item was the first he'd heard of Okpa's exclusion from the debate. Kunkle subsequently called Villalba, and while he stopped short of threatening to pull out of the forum, he strongly urged him to ... More >>

Skipping Your Senior Year? Oh, So Now You Say Something, Linus Wright.

​A fellow Thomas Jefferson High School grad forwards along this brief interview KERA-FM's Bill Zeeble did with former Dallas Independent School District Superintendent Linus Wright, who's now one of Governor Rick Perry's appointees to the Teacher Retirement System of Texas's board of trustees. In ... More >>

Meat Loaf Opens Up On His Latest Album: "I Can Barely Fit My Dick In My Pants"

We admittedly let the April release of Meat Loaf's new album, Hang Cool Teddy Bear, come and go without much ado. But, considering the subject matter of "California Isn't Big Enough (Hey There Girl)," we really couldn't let the new album from Dallas native and Thomas Jefferson High School graduate M ... More >>

It's Not Every Day Some Guy's Selling a '73 Indy 500 Pace Car Replica On My Drive to Work

​I spent way too much time this afternoon on this Web site devoted to the 1973 Indianapolis 500 Pace Car -- which, if you haven't figured it out by now, was a Cadillac Eldorado. But that's only because I spent way too much time inside a 1973 Indianapolis 500 Pace Car yesterday -- or, at the very l ... More >>

Six Flags Moving the Bossman to Dallas

WFMU​Actually, if I'm not mistaken, Six Flags's corporate offices in the DFW are in Grand Prairie on Avenue J East. But today -- which marks the amusement park's return to the New York Stock Exchange following Chapter 11 reorganization -- Six Flags announced that Al Weber Jr., its president and i ... More >>

The Great Floyd Dakil, Who Taught Dallas to "Dance, Franny, Dance," Has Died at 63

The great Floyd Dakil, at far left, died over the weekend.​David Dennard just sent some devastating news: Floyd Dakil is dead. Circumstances remain a little murky, but his bandmates in both Floyd Dakil and the Pitmen and the Floyd Dakil Combo confirm that the man behind the quintessential Dallas r ... More >>

Finally, Thomas Jefferson High's Mike Nesmith Makes It Into Texas Film Hall of Fame

​The Austin Film Society just sent word: After inducting the likes of Morgan Fairchild, Rushmore, the director of Twilight and most everyone else who's ever made a TV show or rented a movie in Texas, it's getting around to putting Mike Nesmith in the Texas Film Hall of Fame come March. Per the pre ... More >>

Some Interesting Crime-Related News and Notes from Chief Kunkle and Ann Margolin

Patrick MichelsSince all of my photos from last night turned out too dark to use, we'll recycle this one again. S'up, Sarah?​The chief and council member attended a little meet-and-greet in Northwest Dallas last night -- big turnout too, about 150 folks who didn't come for the way-too-early-for-th ... More >>

And Now, For Some Good DISD News ...

Thomas Jefferson High School, which, ahem, some of us have always recognized as one of DISD's finest learning establishmentsBased on preliminary calculations and TAKS results, a record number of Dallas Independent School District campuses are poised to be classified as "recognized" or "exemplary" b ... More >>

R.I.P., Temo

That picture you see here is from my 1983 Thomas Jefferson High School Document yearbook. It's of a guy named Tim Watson -- or Temo, as most knew him throughout much of his life. Figured I'd share it, since Tim happens to be the subject of Jeff Liles's Echoes and Reverberations piece for DC9 this we ... More >>

That Bottle Rocket DVD's Everything We Could Have Hoped For

View image Danny Fine, left, and Bob Musgrave in an outtake from Bottle Rocket Spent the better part of last night watching every single second and scrap on the Criterion Collection Wes Anderson-approved Bottle Rocket two-fer, available today (ya think?), and there are copious revelations containe ... More >>

Bill Clinton Stops By Thomas Jefferson for Democratic Party Pep Rally

Bill Clinton Will Be Visiting My Old High School, Thomas Jefferson, On Tuesday

On Sale, T.J. Tees for True Patriots

How We Spent the Fourth

Proud of My Fellow T.J. Patriots

Great, Taylor Publishing. Like Students Need Help Teasing Classmates.

Back in the Day, He Was Da Nu Man

Dallas' Top-Ranked High Schools Not as High on U.S. News' New List

Get Into The Innocent Blues

Meat Loaf, Well Done?

Put On Yer Boots, People

In Local Celebrity Jewish News

"Today" is the Greatest Day But Still One of the Most Overrated Songs Ever

Yup. I Was a Cheerleader. Damned Proud of It. (Well...)

Look, It's The "Definitive 200" Albums of All Time. Sure, If You Don't Have Ears, Absolutely.

Go, TJ Rebels! (Then Again...)

Why, Billy Crudup Is a Golden God...and a Hillcrest Panther

Or: I Clearly Went to the Ursuline Christmas Dance With the Wrong Girl

Dissed by DISD: The Movie

Sliced Meat Loaf

From Funk to Punk, With a Side of Meat Loaf

Groovy, Far Out and Monkee Business

Mazel Tov, Mr. Akinpelu

Reefer Sadness

Dazed and Confused has a flashback

Blue-Collar Nights

To the sound of a Latin beat, the city's working stiffs escape the daily grind at Escapade, two of the biggest nightclubs you've never heard of -- not if English is your first language

Please kill me

A handy guide to the worst local records of the '90s

Out There