Jane’s Window: My Spirited Life in West Texas and Austin by Jane Dunn Sibley (review)

“Giving up is not in my nature” (301) concluded Jane Sibley, after a whirlwind tour through her life from the Pecos County ranch country to the modern environs of Austin. After following her almost ninety-year journey from hard-scrabble desert ranch life to the soaring beauty of the Austin Symphony and the Long Center for the Performing Arts, one is reminded of Jeanette Walls’s Half-Broke Horses (Simon & Schuster, 2009). Woven into her encounters are characters such as Charles Umlauf, Lady Bird Johnson, James Michener, Clayton Williams Jr., Ima Hogg, Stephen Weinberg, Alice Kleberg Reynolds, Frank Erwin, and George W. Bush.

Most people pass through life leaving but a trace of their influence. Not so with Jane Sibley. When she and husband D. J. struck oil, they used their wealth on an astoundingly diverse set of achievements. Jane was an aficionado of high fashion, helped energize Austin’s Laguna Gloria Art Museum and the Austin Symphony Orchestra, and served on the Texas Historical Commission, American Symphony Orchestra League, and National Endowment for the Arts. She was instrumental in establishing Seminole Canyon State Park to preserve rock art. When Austin was razing old buildings, she raised the money to move several of them and restore them into what is today Symphony Square. When the symphony lost access to venues at the University of Texas, she worked with others to raise the money and build the Joe R. and Teresa Lozano Long Center for the Performing Arts.

If there has been one focus to Jane’s life, it is art: “As a barometer of culture, I believe art is even more accurate than works of history . . . What we call ‘history’ depends primarily on who wrote it. Too many authors reshape history to suit their own conceits . . . Art cannot be revised. It simply is” (304). She told her daughter “If you study art you will learn to look more closely at everything around you and then you can enjoy life more fully” (304).

Indeed, she looked closely at life, incorporated the elements that she valued, and enjoyed life on a grand scale. She and D. J. built a glass castle in West Texas, flying the six flags of Texas from its towers. They had memorable parties at both the castle and their Austin home. Appreciating the beauty and role of buzzards, she famously wears a buzzard feather in her chignon and formed the one-member International Buzzard Society. One gets the impression that she is someone with whom you would not wish to tangle. Once the symphony gave her a medallion inscribed “to La Inigualable—She who has no equal” (200). Hers has been a life of hard work—and of tragedies. She lost a son and a daughter, and now D .J. “I did not grieve in the usual sense of that word. Grieving seems to be an emotion I lack,” she reflects (300). “I conditioned myself to deal with whatever life handed me” (301).

Jane praises the people she worked with on all those successes. She is obviously loyal to her friends. Her West Texas and rural roots are deep; she cannot help but defend the use of the term “wetback,” and she argues that despite friend Clayton Williams’s comment about rape that doomed his 1990 gubernatorial campaign, he was unfairly vilified.

As is true with many memoirs, there are times when disjointed stories disrupt the flow of the book. Additionally, a few copyediting errors and factual slips give pause. Yet Jane’s Window, from the Depression years in Pecos County to contemporary Austin, is a fascinating story, rich with Texas history, arts history, and an admirable life by one who has no equal.