by Denis Boyles
If anybody don’t like our way of going about this interesting business, we don’t care. It’s none of their funeral.
—Notice in the Yuma Sentinel Yuma, Arizona 1875
THE DISCOVERY OF UNDERWEAR
We met a couple of “upper ten” ladies of lowa City dressed out and out Bloomer style, black cassimere pants and black cloth coats, high heel boots, finished off with a low crown black hat—I think Duey and I followed them about three squares before our curiosity was satisfied.
—DAVID SPAIN Iowa City, Iowa 1859
The Bloomer was an uncouth being, her hair, cut level with her eyes, depended with the graceful curve of a drake’s tail around the flat Turanian countenance, whose only expression was sullen insolence. The body-dress, glazed brown calico, fitted her somewhat like a soldier’s tunic, developing haunches which would be admired only in venison.
—SIR RICHARD BURTON Horseshoe Station, Wyoming 1860
We bedded our cattle for the last time near Abilene, Kansas. The boss let myself and another boy go to the city one day, so we went into town, tied our ponies, and the first place we visited was a saloon and dance hall. We ordered toddies like we had seen older men do, and drank them down, for we were dry, very dry, as it had been a long ways between drinks. I quit my partner, as he had a girl to talk to, so I went out and in a very short time I went into another store and saloon. I got another toddy, my hat began to stiffen up, but I pushed it up in front, moved my pistol to where it would be handy, then sat down on a box in the saloon and picked up a newspaper and thought I would read a few lines, but my two toddies were at war, so I could not very well understand what I read. I got up and left for more sights—you have seen them in Abilene, Dodge City, and any other places those days. I walked around for perhaps an hour. The two toddies were making me feel different to what I had felt for months, and I thought it was about time for another, so I headed for a place across the street, where I could hear a fiddle. It was a saloon, gambling and dancing hall. I went to the bar and called for a toddy, and as I was drinking it a girl came up and put her little hand under my chin and looked me square in the face and said, “Oh, you pretty Texas boy, give me a drink.” I asked her what she wanted and she said anything I took, so I called for two toddies. My, I was getting rich fast—a pretty girl and plenty of whiskey.
—J.L. MC CALEB Carrizo Springs, Texas c. 1920
I’ve laid it in all of ’em [towns]. I throwed my fannie twentyone times a night, five bucks a throw, and by the time old redeye come up, I was eatin’ breakfast drunker’n an Indian.
—ANONYMOUS Oklahoma panhandle c. 1900
We drove cattle for a month, then rolled into town and there learned two important things about dance-hall gals. Firstly, the longer you have been gone, the better it looks. Second, the better it looks, the more it costs.
—WILLIS BARNES Chicago 1938
5
WOMEN & GUNS
WHAT A COWGIRL NEEDS TO KNOW ABOUT MEN AND GUNS:
1. Strange men will do for you to shoot; or you can scare them to death.
2. Shoot first, ask questions later.
3. If you shoot a man in the back, he rarely has a chance to return fire.
4. Shoot from ambush if possible.
5. If a man needs killing, go ahead and do it, especially if there is no one you can consult about it.
—MRS. FRANK ADAMS c. 1900 quoted by Joyce Gibson Roach in The West That Was
Dear Lewis,
The Apaches came. I’m mighty nigh out of buckshot. Please send more.
Your loving wife.
—MRS. LEWIS STEVENS’s message to her husband after repelling an Indian attack Lonesome Valley, Arizona c. 1874
I shot Mr. Baldwin even though we are related by blood. He ruined me in body and mind.
—VERONA BALDWIN alleged cousin of Lucky Baldwin San Francisco c. 1890
Men sometimes need little reminders. Many’s a time when I tied a string around a man’s finger to help him remember his way home, and every now and then a loaded pistol does wonders to restore a man’s memory of good manners toward women.
—LOUISE BALLCOTT Harmony, Oklahoma 1883
The hotels were overflowing, but the proprietor of one small place agreed to house [Pete] in a room with another guest, provided the consent of the first guest could be secured. This was easily done and the two shared a double bed. Pete and the roommate talked of many things, among them Belle Starr and her escapades. During the conversation, Pete entertained a keen desire to meet this famous Western woman.
The next morning, Pete found that the other guest had risen before him. When he went down to the veranda, a fine horse stood saddled at the rack. His roommate came out and mounted.
“Did you say you’d like to see Belle Starr?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Well,” said the other, turning to gallop away, “you slept with her last night.”
—MODY C. BOATWRIGHT Dallas, Texas c. 1934
Now look-a-here, young fellow, you look honest and smart. You come up to Deadwood with me, and start practicin’ and if there isn’t enough law business to begin with I’ll make it for you.
—CALAMITY JANE to a young lawyer encountered on a train 1877
THE OAKLEY METHOD OF SHOOTING SKEET
You don’t sight them. You just swing with them, and when it feels right, pull.
—ANNIE OAKLEY Darke Country, Ohio c. 1890
I was eight years old when I made my first shot, and I still consider it one of the best shots I ever made. I saw a squirrel run down over the grass in front of the house, through the orchard and stop on the fence to get a hickory nut. I decided to shoot it and ran into the house to get a gun which was hanging on the wall and which I knew to be loaded. I was so little I had to jump up on a chair and slide it down to the mantel and then to the ground. I laid the gun on the railing of the porch, and then recalled that I had heard my brother say about shooting: “It is a disgrace to shoot a squirrel anywhere but in the head because it spoils the meat to hit him elsewhere.” I took the remark literally and decided, in a flash, that I must hit that squirrel in the head, or be disgraced. It was a wonderful shot, going right through the head from side to side. My mother was so frightened when she learned that I had taken down the loaded gun and shot it that I was forbidden to touch it again for eight months.
—ANNIE OAKLEY in Philadelphia Public Ledger 1919
“You cain’t shoot a man in the tail like a quail.”
—ANNIE OAKLEY according to Rogers and Hammerstein’s
Annie Get Your Gun 1947
6
GREENHORNS, TENDERFEET, & OTHER AMUSEMENTS
The funniest sight in the world to a veteran cowhand was a greenhorn who had suffered a sprained ankle or dislocated shoulder from falling off his horse.
—WILLIAM H. FORBIS Bozeman, Montana 1973
There was once this man from back East who thought he would fancy the life of a cowpoke, so he joined up for a cattle drive. The first night, as the men were bedding down, someone tossed the man a piece of wood. “Here, enjoy this,” he said. “Tomorrow we’re hitting the plains and you cain’t git no kind of pillow out there.” They say the fellow gave up and went home the next day.
—ANONYMOUS
30 miles to water
20 miles to wood
10 inches to Hell
Gone Back East to Wife’s family
—Sign found on the door of an abandoned shack Texas panhandle c. 1910
A tenderfoot, a regular softie greenhorn, come out from the East. I was dealin’ at a little minin’ joint called White Bonanza in Colorado. This tenderfoot sat in the game, and he lost from the first turn.
“I say, you know,” he blurts out, “you must be cheating!”
Well, if it hadn’t been for his blamed Eastern accent, I’d ha’ shot him without thinkin’. As it was, everyone ducked. I jest looked at him and said, “Young man, that means shootin’ out here.”
He got pretty white
and said, “I—I didn’t mean any harm, but when you get a man’s money and he hasn’t any opportunity to get it back, it looks queer, don’t you know? After all, old chap, gambling is cheating.”
The rest o’ the boys began to hustle him away, but I stopped ’em,an’ made him explain. He didn’t know any more about monty than a hog does about a side-saddle, but he could argufy the spots off’n the cards. After he got through, I sat athinkin’.
“Boys,” I said, “this kid is right, though he don’t know which end of a gun to load. I’m a-goin’ to earn money after this.”
One o’ the boys, who had a claim that hadn’t panned out any too good, though there was pay dirt in it, sung out. “I’ll trade you, sight unseen, my claim for what you got in the bank and yo’r lay-out.”
“You’re covered,” says I, and I ain’t never bet a cent on a card from that day to this.
—SHANE RYDER Abilene, Kansas 1869
Early in the spring of 1882 I was employed by a Mark Withers of Lockhart, to go up the trail with a herd to Kansas. I was pretty much of a “tenderfoot,” just a slip of a boy, and the hands told me [another rider named] Hill was a pretty tough character and would steal anything he could get his hands on, besides he might kill me if I didn’t watch him. They loaded me up pretty well on this kind of information, and I really believed it. They would steal my matches, cartridges, cigarette papers, and handkerchiefs, and tell me that Hill got them. I reached the time when I was deprived of almost everything I had and even had to skin prickly pears to get wrapping for my cigarettes, believing all the while that the fellow Hill had cleaned me up. Things were getting serious and I was desperate, and if Hill made any kind of a break the consequences would have probably been disaster. At last Hill, who was fully aware of the game that was being played on me, called me aside and told me that it was all a put-up job, and said it had been carried far enough. We all had a good laugh and from that time forward harmony reined in camp.
—HENRY D. STEELE San Antonio, Texas 1920
The first day in the saddle on the open range was a tough one on the tenderfoot. The easiest saddle on the rider in the world once you are used to it, the cow saddle is far harder to get on comfortable terms with than the flat pigskin; it gives a beginner harder cramps and tender spots on more parts of the anatomy than any punishment conceivable short of an inquisition rack.
—EDGAR BEECHER BRONSON New York City 1910
The ranch foreman, on welcoming Mr. New Yorker, a visitor, would say something like the following: “Mr. New Yorker, shake hands with Hen. Hen, this is Mr. New Yorker from back East. He’s a friend of the boss. Mr. New Yorker, Hen’s been with our outfit for six years, and is generally reckoned to be the slickest rider in this half of the country.”
If, after Hen had passed beyond carshot, Mr. New Yorker had asked the foreman for Hen’s last name, the questioner would have seen a look of sudden surprise, and would have heard: “Well, I’ll be damned. I never thought of that. He likely has got one somewhere. I dunno what it is. He’s just Hen, and if he thinks that’s good enough for him, it shore is for us, and that’s about the size of it. Say, stranger, let me give you some advice: If I were you I wouldn’t try to hurry nothing’, and I’d travel on the idea that Hen likely gave a first-class funeral to the rest of his names, and I wouldn’t ask him for no resurrections.”
—PHILIP ASHTON ROLLINS Cheyenne, Wyoming 1922
Soon as the newness wears off, [greenhorns] quit and go back with the idea that they know all about this—that there’s no more to learn—when at the same time they haven’t started to know at all, and are just as helpless as ever. Some folks have an idea that you can qualify to be an all around good cowhand in a couple of years, and where they get that idea, I don’t know.
—FOREMAN Three Rivers Cattle Company, Montana 1902
RISKY BUSINESS
I am going to say something about the great American game—draw poker. It stands alone, in a class by itself. If it have a peer, ‘tis the game of life. Life itself is but a gamble. I am not a gambler, but most real cowmen or punchers I ever knew could play good enough to lose.
—OSCAR RUSH Salt Lake City, Utah 1930
I’m buyin’ a round of drinks an’ supper for the whole crowd. An’ if anybody present reckons he can play poker he’s goin’ to need a barrel to get home in.
—HOPALONG CASSIDY
RODEO
It takes a lot of courage for a man to pay out his dollar to enter a rodeo and then, after not winning a red cent, walk away saying, “Sure lucky I didn’t get hurt.”
—HOOT GIBSON Hollywood, California 1912
The rules of the sport are simple. As soon as the steer leaves the chute, it is followed by the wrestler and the hazer, the latter’s object being to prevent it dodging away from the wrestler’s horse.
As the wrestler approaches the steer, he leans sideways in the saddle ready to throw himself on its shoulders and grasp it by the horns. The faster the pace, the easier it is to obtain a grip quickly—the most difficult steers being those which will not gallop and allow the horses to outstrip them. Once the wrestler has flung himself out of the saddle—some literally dive forward, being clear of the horse before they touch the steer—his immediate object is to use his legs as a brake, while grasping the animal by its horns, and bring it to a stand. Sometimes the man will be dragged half across the ground before he can attempt the throw. Sometimes—and this is one of the greatest risks—the steer will overbalance on account of the man’s weight and the pace, turning a complete somersault. This is called “hoolihaning” a steer and does not count as a throw. Occasionally the wrestler fails to obtain a hold and falls under the steer and the galloping horses. But as a rule the man is very sure of his grip; the ammal is pulled up, and with every second counting in his chances of a prize the wrestler uses the leverage of the horns, obtaining a scientific lock, and if he is lucky twists the animal over, bringing it down on its side and raising a hand as signal to the judges. The time of the record throw is seven seconds, counted from the moment the steer crosses the white line opposite the chute.
—R.B. CUNNINGHAME GRAHAM London 1936
BUSTIN’ BRONCS
We would have lots of fun trying to prove who was the best rider, but oftentimes the horse would prove that he was onto his job better than any of us.
—F.M. POLK Luling, Texas c. 1920
Being a rodeo rider is a state of mind. It is for yourself—your self-esteem, pride and ego. You’re brainwashed at an early age to want to emulate your heroes. You always want to be like them. For a lot of kids, myself included, cowboys are the last real heroes.
—CHRIS LEDOUX Kaycee, Wyoming 1994
I was a saddle-bronc rider, and here’s how it worked: They bring the animal in, I would put my saddle on it, and that animal and I would be physically connected for eight seconds, and if I won I’d get my paycheck, get in my car and go on to the next rodeo. The eight seconds is the time that everyone has to ride; you have to ride for eight seconds or you are disqualified. If you get bumped off before that, you are disqualified. If you touch the animal with your free hand, you are disqualified. If you don’t have your spurs in a certain position when the ride starts, you are disqualified. If you do all that, then they start giving you points and the man who gets the most points gets the most money. Then you’re in your car and down the road going to the next rodeo.
—DON FARMER Elko, Nevada 1994
Keep your jewels clear!
—STEPHEN BALDWIN Hollywood, California costar of 8 Seconds 1994
It takes plenty of nerve to come out of the chutes aloft a plunging bundle of dynamite with hooves; and it takes plenty of riding ability to stay on for ten seconds (the required length of the ride). There’s more to it than just staying on, too. The horse must come out bucking, or the rider gets a mount that will. Rider must come out of the chutes spurring, with blunt spurs, high on the shoulders, and continue to spur from the shoulders back to flank throughout the ride. Both
feet must be kept in the stirrups. The rein must be held in one hand, not wrapped around, and the other hand must be kept in the air, and must not touch the brone, the rider, or the saddle! The contestant must use a committee saddle and halter, but he furnishes his own rein, chaps, and spurs.
—MAX KEGLEY Phoenix, Arizona 1942
MARK TWAIN’S DANCING LESSON
The dancers are formed in two long ranks, facing each other, and the battle opens with some light skirmishing between the pickets, which is gradually resolved into a general engagement along the whole line; after that you have nothing to do but stand by and grab every lady that drifts within reach of you, and swing her. It is very entertaining, and elaborately scientific also.
—SAMUEL CLEMENS in The Territorial Enterprise Virginia City, Nevada c. 1862
NEWS
The individual who left three kittens, and a dog with a tin pan tied to his narrative, on our office stairs last night, can have them in a transfigured state by calling at the butcher shop. We would modestly suggest that we have no further call for such supplies.
—The Daily Monitor Fort Scott, Kansas 1870