“It is my land, my home, my fathers’ land, to which I now ask to be allowed to return. I want to spend my last days there, and be buried among those...
The Divorce Seekers
After gambling away my earnings from wrangling horses at the notorious Cowboy Bar in Jackson, Wyoming, I shipped my footlocker and saddle freight...
Things We Get Wrong About David Crockett
David Crockett (1786-1836), has a tremendous responsibility. He fills niches in American History, folklore and popular culture. Details of his life...
The Legendary Life & Tragic Death of Sonny Jim
About 1,000 people came to praise the old Indian cowboy, not bury him. They came from far and wide, from California to Oklahoma to Oregon and more,...
Hawaii’s Cowboy Tradition
The steam from the volcano diffused the dawn as the cattle drive reached the shoreline where the Pacific Ocean rolled into Kawaihae Bay. While some...
Who Is Boley Brown?
Heading east on Highway 380 from Post, Texas, to the ghost town of Clairemont is a 45-minute drive through a wide open and sparsely populated...
A Lot of Work for Two Cents
Early in June 1880, census enumerator Charles M. Cantrell came to dwelling number 14 on his list in Davidson County, Tennessee. Cantrell wrote down...
A Mirror with a Memory
An Indian with his thick, long braids wrapped in otter fur stands beside an oil portrait of a woman and a baby. Who was this man? What had happened...
General Palmer’s Baby Railroad
In 1870, a former Union Army general named William Palmer supervised construction of the Kansas Pacific Railway into Denver, Colorado. The arrival...
Wanted Posters Fonts are Actually Egyptian?
Those “almost square-block serifs hanging for dear life onto needle-thin verticals” on Old West Wanted posters are actually so-called Egyptian fonts...
Trumpeting Elephants & Kicking Asses
On August 27, 1871, an arcing ax handle landed solidly on John Lemon’s head, plummeting him to the ground. The Doña Ana County politician and...
The Apaches Spoke, and Eve Ball Listened
Along Highway 380, in Lincoln County, New Mexico, stands a new historic marker, honoring Eve Ball for “saving oral histories certain to be lost...