Cowboy Culture
Gretchen Beilfuss Witt
December 6, 2007

The cowboy of the American West is one of the best-known cultural icons of the United States. He is a central figure in the American mythology reflecting the courage, honor and individualism with which Americans identify. However, the original cowboy is a much different figure than either the “tough straight-talking hero” or the “lawless, wild villain spreading mayhem on the frontier”. At the beginning of the range-cattle industry, they were generally young men - the average age was twenty-four. “Nearly one cowboy in three was either Mexican or black.” . The hours were long, dirty and difficult and the pay was minimal. Many of the cowboys were former soldiers – mustered out Union soldiers tired of the overworked dairy farms of the northeast, Confederate veterans looking for any work, or freed slaves. By some definitions, the true heyday of the cowboy really lasted only one generation, beginning at the close of the Civil War and ending in the mid-1880’s. Others will say the story of the cowboy began much earlier when cattle was first brought the Americas by the Spanish in 1494 and extends even to the present day.

David Dary in his book “Cowboy Culture: A Saga of Five Centuries” traces the history of cattle and the vaquero in New Spain, its evolution as the Mexican cattle ranching stretched up into the United States and its eventual spread across the American West after the Civil War and continues up to the turn of the century.

William Savage, Jr. has put together a collection of commentaries about cowboys and the life of they led in “Cowboy Life Reconstructing An American Myth”. Walter Baron von Richthofen, the nephew of the Red Baron who himself was a cattle rancher in the American West and Joseph Nimmo, Jr. the chief of the U.S. Bureau of Statistics in 1886 are among those whose fascinating views are included.

Richard W. Slatta, a professor at NC State University, presents a lovely illustrated history of the cowboy considering both the “golden age” of the late 1800’s and the modern cattleman. In “Cowboy” he takes a look at ranching and the changes over time as well as the cowboy image as it is related to food, apparel, and popular culture.

Books devoted to cowboy antique collecting, black cowboys, and artistic works portraying the American cowboy at his work and even rodeo heroes like Ty Murray can be found in our collection. While checking out the books at the library visit the display of cowboy postcards and other memorabilia shown in the case on the third floor of Headquarters.