Susan McAtee Monday was born in Waco, Texas in 1948. Her father taught chemistry at Baylor University. As a child, Monday attended the Baylor Children’s Theatre under the direction of Kitty Baker and Jearnine Wagner. At the age of 12, Monday moved to Houston, but remained in contact with the children’s theater program and was later a contributor to the Our Theatre, a Place for Ideas book written by Wagner and Baker. In 1964, Paul Baker moved his theatre company from Bayor to Trinity University. Monday participated in the Youth In Motion summer programs at Trinity under the direction of Luanne Klaras and Virginia DuPuy. After high school, she attended Trinity, studying studio art, and received a B.A in 1970.
While at Trinity she continued working with the Ideas in Motion Program as a student teacher. She contributed to Wagner’s Unlimited Potential Program, working with youth from area schools, as well as Hemisfair’s Children’s Garden and the Intercambio Exchange Program. Monday joined the core group that would organize the Learning About Learning Educational Foundation (LAL) in 1971. She developed programs, exhibits and publications, and led LAL’s Idea Workshop. As the creative arm of the organization, the Idea Workshop served as an incubator for ideas and themes that could reach children, schools and families across the city. These ideas and themes were often further developed in the Laboratory School, teacher training, new products and services.
After Learning About Learning closed in 1986, Monday worked as a writer for both the San Antonio Light and Our Kids Magazine. From 1993-1998 she was the Director of Exhibits and Programs at the San Antonio Children’s Museum. Monday has since established herself as a fulltime textile and fiber artist and teacher in the South Texas region, regularly participating in exhibitions and offering online and in-person workshops.
Julia Byrns Jarrell was born in Dallas, Texas in 1945. Jarrell participated in the Dallas Theatre Center when it was associated with Baylor University’s theatre program under the direction of Paul Baker. Jarrell attended Trinity University and received a BA in 1967 and a MA in 1980.
In 1970 she and her husband Charles Jarrell were invited to be part of the development team of what would become the Learning About Learning Educational Foundation. From 1974-1978 Jarrell was co-director with Cynthia Herbert of the foundation’s Lab School. Jarrell’s thesis publication, An interdisciplinary arts model for curriculum invention (1980) documents her work in the Lab School, with focus on the development of elementary school students’ multi-year ethnographic investigation of the traditional play Los Pastores. Jarrell utilized observational fieldwork in other projects with LAL such as the Future/Past (1972) mission field trips and publication and the City Scope program series (1983-1984).
After LAL closed in 1986, Jarrell led the LBJ Heartland Network with the National Parks Service and the Lyndon Baines Johnson National Historical Park, which fostered support for the area’s natural environment and cultural heritages.
From 2000-2016 Jarrell worked with Alamo Colleges International Program Office as a program and project developer and led several initiatives for international educators and youth.
After retirement, Jarrell dedicated her time to the Interfaith Welcome Coalition, visiting detention centers along the Texas border, speaking with women and children from Central America who were seeking asylum in the United States.
As of 2022, Jarell is working with other founding LAL members on legacy projects that chronicle the impact the foundation had with creative and differentiated educational thinking.
Encino Press was founded by William "Bill" Wittliff and Sally Bowers Wittliff in 1964 in Dallas, Texas, before eventually relocating to Austin. Encino Press was dedicated to the publication of regional material related to Texas and the Southwest. Its catalog totaled over 140 items, including publications of the Institute of Texas Cultures, the Texas Folklore Society Annual Bulletin, and exhibit catalogues for Texas museums and libraries. Authors published by teh press include J. Frank Dobie, Walter P. Webb, Larry McMurtry, Edwin Shrake, Edward Tinker, Ramon Adams, and Ben K. Green. Books often featured the work of contemporary southwestern artists, including Ancel Nunn, John Groth, and Barbara Whitehead. Each work was designed by Bill Wittliff. Encino Press was dissolved in the 1980s.
William "Bill" Dale Wittliff was born on January 21, 1940 in Taft, Texas, son of William and Laura (Sachtleben) Wittliff. His parents divorced when he was young, and Wittliff moved to a ranch in Blanco upon his mother's remarriage. He graduated from the University of Texas in Austin in 1963 with a bachelor's degree in journalism. He married Sally Bowers in 1963, and they had two children, Reid and Allison.
After graduation he worked as a business and production manager for Southern Methodist University Press. Around this time, Wittliff and his wife founded a the Encino Press, a book publishing company which specialized in regional material about the Southwest, with a particular focus on Texas. Encino Press remained in operation through the 1980s.
Wittliff gained renown as a screenwriter. His most notable works included "The Black Stallion" (1979), "Honeysuckle Rose" (1980), "Barbarosa" (1982), "Lonesome Dove" (1989), "Legends of the Fall" (1994), and "The Perfect Storm" (2000). He also wrote a series of novels, beginning with "The Devil's Backbone" (2014). Wittliff was also a noted photographer.
In 1986 Wittliff founded the Southwest Writers Collection at Texas State University, which features works by authors from Texas and the American Southwest. The Wittliff Collections are one of the most extensive archives of Southwestern materials in the United States.
Bill Wittliff died in 2019 of a heart attack.