NOVEMBER MARKED a milestone at The Mirror office in our sideline of (very limited) book selling. For the first time in many years, a new Texas Almanac has been published and we won’t be getting it from the Dallas Morning News.

That’s because The News last year gave the Almanac, lock, stock and barrel to the Texas State Historical Association, which has released the 2010-2011 edition. The Association is continuing the longtime tradition of offering the Almanac to newspapers for resale; we’ve placed our order.

Long known as an invaluable reference book for all things Texan, the Almanac dates back to 1857, when it was published by the Galveston News, predecessor to the Dallas Morning News,

An edition was published each year through 1873 except for 1866.

BECAUSE THE Union Navy blockaded Galveston during the Civil War, the publication was moved to Houston in 1862.

In 1867 publication resumed in Galveston and the name was changed to The Texas Almanac and Emmigrant’s Guide to Texas. This was at a time when the state needed to attract settlers, unlike today.

The 1873 edition was the last in the 19th century because editor Willard Richardson died in 1875 and there was no one to pick up his torch.

When the Galveston newspaper spun off the Dallas Morning News in 1885 as a North Texas branch, G.B. Dealey was sent to Dallas to start the paper. Dealey saw the Almanac as a tool for Texas economic development and in 1904 publication was resumed.

ANOTHER GAP in the series occurred during World War I. The present series began in 1925 and there were annual editions util 1929, when the Depression caused a change to the every two years cycle that continues today.

Stuart Malcolm McGregor, who had edited the Texas Almanac since 1925, retired in 1961 after publication of the 1961–62 edition, which was dedicated to him by the publishers. The editorial policies and format that he established were continued in later editions.

In 1961, Walter B. Moore became Almanac editor. Fred R. Pass, one-time reporter and head of The News’ one-time East Texas Bureau in Tyler, succeeded him in 1973.

Upon Pass’s resignation in 1981, Michael T. Kingston became editor, serving until his death in 1994, Mary G. Ramos was then named editor, the first woman to hold the position. She retired in 2003, and the Almanac is now edited by Elizabeth Cruce Alvarez and Robert Plocheck.

MS. ALVAREZ describes the newest Almanac as the largest, most colorful yet published. It includes color relief maps of each of the state’s 254 counties, complete with major and minor roads, waterways and other features, as did the previous edition. (Lake Gilmer made it into the 2008-09 Almanac, showing up as smaller than Lake Gladewater but the same general shape.)

According to the press kit for the new Almanac it also features:

*An article on Lady Bird Johnson by biographer Jan Jarboe Russell that looks at her East Texas childhood (near and in Marshall) and how nature influenced her work as First Lady.

*A history of Scandinavians in Texas.

* A look at the way Texas is carved into regions, including our Piney Woods.

* An entry on Texas earthquakes that includes significant quakes back to 1811.

* Historical lists of high school football and basketball champions.

* A table of the state’s largest trees.

* County-by-county results of the 2008 prmaries and elections.

* A comprehesive table of state prisons by county.

The Texas State Historical Associaiton was founded in 1897 and for most of its history was based in Austin. Its home is now Denton, where it has entered into a new collaboration with the University of North Texas .

The TSHA core program includes the Southwestern Historical Quarterly, oldest continuously published scholarly journal in Texas; the Handbook of Texas Online and a book program that publishes both new titles and reprints of Texas history classics.

The association’s 114th annual meeting is scheduled for March 4 at the Marriott Qourum Hotel in Dallas.

Items are being gathered now for the Silent Auction of Tours and Texana, which will include private tours, rare books, maps and objects. And it will again be a great temptation for those of us fascinated by, and driven to collect, Texas books.

sgreene@tatertv.com