Cowboy life: reconstructing an American myth

By William W. Savage Jr.

Book Overview

First published in 1975 and now in paperback, Cowboy Life continues to be a landmark study on the historical and legendary dimensions of the cowboy.The central figure in American mythology, the cowboy... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0806112182
• ISBN13: 9780806112183
• Release Date: January 1975
• Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 1.34 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Cowboys: The Myth vs. Reality

William Savage is disturbed over the cowboy myth that has developed, especially in the last half-century or so. Depicting cowboys as gun-toting toughs, heroic, ever-free men of the range living extremely exciting and envious lives, is a lot of bunk according to Savage. Actually cowboys were often unsavory characters, often uneducated, unable to gain employment in other occupations, who had the ability to ride a horse decently and for many hours at a stretch. Although they were expected to be brave and resourceful, they were rarely heroic, and usually spent most of their time performing deadly dull chores for very little pay. In this book, Savage collects 13 excerpts from cowboy reminiscences (for the most part), published between 1874 and 1906 that show real cowboys in real settings doing real cowboy work. The longest and perhaps best is from a book published by the National Live Stock Historical Association in 1905 that is already weary of the myth that had developed about the cowboy and tried to describe this man, from his dress to his manner to his duties, as authentically as possible. Compared to what is often depicted in movies and commercials (The Marlboro Man) and western fiction, it presents quite a different picture. Other authors represented are Charlie Siringo, W.S. James, and Andy Adams. For the second edition, Savage wrote a heated Afterward where he condemns the continuance of the mythmaking at the expense of honest history. Those wanting a realistic look at the life of cowboys should look into this book.

Original Documents

Each chapter in this book is the account of what men who were either cowboys, ranchers, reporters, etc. observed and thought about cowboy life. It is a good book and interesting.

Home on the Range

This is a collection of writings from the 19th and early 20th centuries about cowboys and cattle drives during the "Lonesome Dove" years after the Civil War. The book includes a large selection of full-page monochrome photographs of working cowboys, dating back to the 1880s. Readers can trace the emergence of the cowboy as mythic figure, from his origins as a wild, unsavory character often regarded as a public menace in the frontier towns for his hard drinking and shoot-em-up antics. Readers will learn a great deal about the hard work and dangers of cowboying. And you get a sense of how cowboys on the range (most of them very young) were an elite fraternity of workmen, with specialized skills and a code of behavior that stoically honored bravery, while spending lavishly on saddles and the latest fashions in trail-wear. You also get a sense of how brief this period of history actually was, as the frontier swiftly moved westward and open rangeland was fenced in. My favorite selections in the book are accounts by the cowboys themselves, describing the day-to-day routines and the occasional adventures of life on the trail. Among these is an excerpt from cowboy author, Andy Adams, whose "Log of a Cowboy" is a classic of Western literature. The editor of the collection, William W. Savage, Jr., who holds a PhD from the University of Oklahoma, has written an informative introduction based on what seems to be considerable familiarity with the subject of the American West.