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Ranch Roping: The Complete Guide to a Classic Cowboy Skill Buck Brannaman, AJ Mangum One hundred full-color photographs of Buck in action enhance the step-by-step methodology that leads to mastering this essential Western skill. |
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Fried Twinkies, Buckle Bunnies, & Bull Riders: A Year Inside the Professional Bull Riders Tour Josh Peter In this intimate look at a fascinating subculture, award-winning sports journalist Josh Peter takes readers along on the Professional Bull Riders tour to witness the death-defying confrontation between man and beast that has made bull riding the fastest growing sport in the world. Success in this sport is measured in seconds--staying on a bull for 8 seconds without getting tossed is likely to secure the rider a big score. Josh Peter captures the high drama of the sport and introduces readers to a culture that's rife with colorful characters: courageous riders, scouts, breeders, love-struck groupies, and a few of those very angry bulls. |
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Barrel Racing for Fun and Fast Times: Winning Tips for Horse and Rider Sharon Camarillo How to select, train, and compete on a winning barrel racer. Barrel racing, in which horse and rider gallop in a cloverleaf pattern around three barrels, is the fastest-growing rodeo event. Author Sharon Camarillo, a successful contestant-turned trainer, teacher, and commentator, presents a comprehensive program that takes the novice barrel racer from the process of choosing her horse up to preparation for and taking part in real races. More than just a specialized manual, Barrel Racing for Fun and Fast Times offers advice that will benefit riders of all disciplines, including ways to care for and condition the equine athlete, selecting appropriate and proper-fitting equipment, acquiring the “winning edge” that allows us to achieve competitive success, and more. 160 color illustrations |
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Chasing the Rodeo: On Wild Rides and Big Dreams, Broken Hearts and Broken Bones, and One Man's Search for the West W. K. Stratton From its roots as the quintessential Western pastime, rodeo has grown into an international, prime-time television sport. Steeped in tradition and spirit, the rodeo calls aspiring cowboys and cowgirls to its rough-and-tumble fame as they repeatedly risk their lives for eight seconds of triumph. In Chasing the Rodeo, Kip Stratton takes us into the addictive core of bull riding and the circuit that has grown up around it. Immersing himself in the world of rodeo, Stratton collides with the specter of his runaway "rodeo bum" father, finding part of the cowboy dream that was his father's legacy.
As much a tribute to the famed characters of the old West-Freckles Brown, Lucille Mulhall (the first cowgirl), Wild Bill Hickok, Lane Frost-as it is a riveting look at today's superstars who are triumphantly rocketing the sport to NASCAR fan levels, Chasing the Rodeo is a bucking, riveting, glorious ride.
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Horses That Buck: The Story of Champion Bronc Rider Bill Smith (Western Legacies) Margot Kahn When asked in an interview what he most liked about rodeo, three-time world champion saddle-bronc rider “Cody” Bill Smith said simply, “Horses that buck.” Smith redefined the image of America’s iconic cowboy. Determined as a boy to escape a miner’s life in Montana, he fantasized a life in rodeo and went on to earn thirteen trips to the national finals, becoming one of the greatest of all riders. This biography puts readers in the saddle to experience the life of a champion rider in his quest for the gold buckle. Drawing on interviews with Smith and his family and friends, Margot Kahn recreates the days in the late 1960s and early 1970s when rodeo first became a major sports enterprise. She captures the realities of that world: winning enough money to get to the next competition, and competing even when in pain. She also tells how, in his career’s second phase, Smith married cowgirl Carole O’Rourke and went into business raising horses, gaining notoriety for his gentle hand with animals and winning acclaim for his and Carole’s Circle 7 brand. Inducted into the Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame in 1979 and the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum’s Rodeo Hall of Fame in 2000, Smith was a legend in his own time. His story is a genuine slice of rodeo life—a life of magic for those good enough to win. This book will delight rodeo and cowboy enthusiasts alike. |
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Barrel Racing 101: A Complete Program for Horse and Rider Marlene McRae |
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Wild West Shows and the Images of American Indians, 1883-1933 L.G. Moses Between the 1880s and the 1930s Show Indians depicted their warfare with whites and portrayed scenes from their culture in productions that traveled throughout the United States and Europe and drew huge audiences--well over a million people in 1885 alone. The view that they were tipi-and-war-bonnet Indians exploited by entrepreneurs like Buffalo Bill was commonly held by reformers of the 1890s, and has been uncritically accepted ever since. This book, now available in paperback, is the first to examine the lives and experiences of Show Indians from their own point of view. Their dances, re-enactments of battles, and village encampments, the author demonstrates, helped preserve the Indians' cultural heritage through decades of forced assimilation. This book also looks at Wild West shows as ventures in the entertainment business. By considering financing, scripting, recruitment, logistics, and public and creditor perceptions, L. G. Moses reveals the complexity of the enterprise and the numerous--and often contradictory--meanings the shows had for Indians, entrepreneurs, audiences, and government officials. |
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The Pastures of Beyond: An Old Cowboy Looks Back at the Old West Dayton O. Hyde No one is better suited to convey the flavor of the Old West than this authentic American original, whose colorful tales of cowboys, Indians, and the horses they rode have the grace of poetry and the power of myth. At age thirteen, Dayton Hyde, a spirited beanpole of a boy, ran away from home in Michigan to Yamsi, his uncle’s ranch in eastern Oregon. This was in the 1930s, and Yamsi was one of the last great cattle ranches of the West. Soon the boy, nicknamed “Hawk,” was riding a horse, soaking up ranch life from the hired hands, and winning the cowboys’ respect. A natural bronco buster, he eventually became a rodeo rider, bull fighter, clown, and photographer, working all over the West with the likes of Slim Pickens, Rex Allen, and Mel Lambert—all of whom went on to careers in Hollywood—and selling pictures to Life magazine. After the Second World War, he took over the reins at Yamsi, ensuring its survival in changing times. Now, half a century later, he gives us his valedictory ode to that last great period of the Old West. Full of humor, rollicking stories, and love of the land, Hyde pays homage to the cowboys, Indians, and great horses that made the West the legend it is today. |
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Professional Bull Riders: The Official Guide to the Toughest Sport on Earth Jeffrey Johnstone, Keith Ryan Cartwright This is not a rodeo. They don't rope calves or chase barrels. This is bull riding, and the first rule is to just stay alive. It's one man, one bull, and eight precious seconds. This book is your ticket to the action. All of the blood, sweat, and dirt is here in a full-color collection of breathtaking, action-packed photographs from the Professional Bull Riders. The PBR is one of the fastest-growing sports in history, boasting multimillion-dollar purses for its athletes and more than 100 million television viewers in 70 countries across the globe. That's no small feat when you consider that less than two decades ago the PBR was nothing more than a dream shared by 20 cowboys. Longtime fans of the sport will get a behind-the-chutes look at their favorite riders and bulls. All the greats are here, from Adriano Moraes, Justin McBride, and Chris Shivers to Little Yellow Jacket and Mossy Oak Mudslinger. Newcomers will get a clear and concise introduction to the sport--its origins, the rules of competition, and what it takes to become a champion--and an overview of the Western way of life. This collection of lavish photographs is a visual treat for anyone interested in the world's toughest sport. |
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Buffalo Bill's Wild West: Celebrity, Memory, and Popular History Joy S. Kasson A fascinating analysis of the first famous American to erase the boundary between real history and entertainment
Canada, and Europe. Crowds cheered as cowboys and Indians--and Annie Oakley!--galloped past on spirited horses, sharpshooters exploded glass balls tossed high in the air, and cavalry troops arrived just in time to save a stagecoach from Indian attack. Vivid posters on billboards everywhere made William Cody, the show's originator and star, a world-renowned figure.
Joy S. Kasson's important new book traces Cody's rise from scout to international celebrity, and shows how his image was shaped. Publicity stressed his show's "authenticity" yet audiences thrilled to its melodrama; fact and fiction converged in a performance that instantly became part of the American tradition.
But how, precisely, did that come about? How, for example, did Cody use his audience's memories of the Civil War and the Indian wars? He boasted that his show included participants in the recent conflicts it presented theatrically, yet he also claimed it evoked "memories" of America's bygone greatness. Kasson's shrewd, engaging study--richly illustrated--in exploring the disappearing boundary between entertainment and public events in American culture, shows us just how we came to imagine our memories.
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