Before the discovery of oil and the advent of Progressivism to Texas, the state dealt with prison overcrowding by leasing convicts and their labor to private in

Gus S. Wortham was a good businessman. Among other enterprises, he started a highly successful insurance company, American General, and helped to shape the econ

A chronicle one of the harshest, most exploitative labor systems in American history In his seminal study of convict leasing in the post-Civil War South, Matthe