The west has a long tradition of enjoying the eccentricities of oddball characters - people like Joshua Norton, who declared himself Emperor of the United States in 1859 and was treated with honors by san Francisco citizens for the rest of his life. There’s even a movement today to name the bay bridge for …
Category: Westerners
National Day of the Cowboy
The last Saturday of July is the National Day of the Cowboy. Many of the first cowboys really were boys - at least, they were when they started out. The job was hard, dirty and dangerous - they had to quickly become men. The cowboy began in the Southwest. The Spanish created the first big …
Dignity Graces a South Dakota Riverbank
A new statue overlooks the Missouri River in the central part of South Dakota. Called Dignity, it’s a 50 foot tall image of a Native American woman and is made of stainless steel and glass. It is a magnificent work of art, Designed by Dale Claude Lamphere and erected recently, in September 2016. It …
The Emperor of the United States
California is known for some pretty odd characters. It started in the early days; the crazy time of the 49’ers brought out some outrageous personalities. One of the biggest was Joshua Abraham Norton - The Emperor of the United States. Norton was an Englishman that grew up in South Africa. He was a successful …
How to Wear a Cowboy Hat
One of my favorite writers published a piece that told the rules for wearing a cowboy hat. That writer is Bob Boze Bell, an Arizona cowboy who is also the publisher of True West Magazine. Now, I like wearing a cowboy hat; not only is there nothing better for shading your head and neck, …
