This is Volume I of "A Lens on Texas", a four-volume photo-and-history centric book on Texas. This effort started as just a pure photo-book showcasing the author's 20 years of Texas regional landscape photography. However, Texas being Texas, it soon morphed to include a deeper dive into the history of Texas and its cultural aspects, supplemented by the author’s equally-extensive journal of photography of the places where this history occurred. The result is a unique and beautiful set providing a chronologically curated history of Texas, supplemented with side-bars, insights, analysis and photography that help bring the story alive, concluding with a stand-alone Volume IV photo-book dedicated to the author's favorite areas across Texas' vast and varied regional landscapes.

This Volume I begins with the "First Peoples" to inhabit Texas 20,000 years ago, to the Native American civilizations that emerged, and continues through the 300 years of Spain's colonization effort ending in 1821. In addition to the fascinating storyline of this part of Texas history, this Volume I contains several Photo Essays and Side-bar extensions, including various Paleo Indian sites; the “Lady in Blue” miracle resulting in the first mission in Texas; the El Paso Missions, the cities of El Paso/Ciudad Juarez, Presidio and Redford; and the other Spanish Missions from San Antonio to Goliad to Menard that can still be seen today.