Will Rogers once wrote, "Charlie Russell is the only western artist a true cowboy can't find fault with." Rogers also considered Charlie America's best storyteller, cowboy humorist, and sagebrush philosopher. Though Charlie was under-schooled and semi-illiterate, his salty writings still delight readers eight decades after he crossed "the big divide." Richard Bird Baker has long strived to bring Russell's wit, humor, cynicism, and horse sense back to life, depicting Charlie writing letters about current events, trends, and issues in colorful cowboy lingo. This edition is a must for fans of cowboy humor, salty metaphors, and sagebrush philosophy.

213 p. ; 23 cm.

Will Rogers wrote, "Charlie Russell is the only author a true cowboy can't find fault with." Rogers also considered Charlie America's best story teller, cowboy humorist, and sagebrush philosopher. Though Charlie was under-schooled and semi-literate, his salty Rawhide Rawlins yarns still delight readers almost nine decades after he "crossed the big divide." Richard Baker has long striven to bring Russell's wit, humor, cynicism, and horse sense back to life. In this collection of Western yarns, Mr. Baker utilizes Charlie Russell as his narrator, depicting Charlie telling yarns in his personal style, utilizing ample dry humor expressed in colorful cowboy lingo. These yarns cover many facets of late-nineteenth-century cowboy life, the good times and the hardships, the joys and sorrows, and above all, the humor and good nature of the western folk icon, the American cowboy. This book is a must for fans of cowboy humor, salty western metaphors, and sagebrush philosophy.

Will Rogers wrote, CHARLIE RUSSELL is the only western artist a true cowboy cant find fault with. Rogers also considered Charlie Americas best storyteller, cowboy humorist, and sagebrush philosopher. Though Charlie was under-schooled and semi-literate, his salty Rawhide Rawlins yarns still delight readers eight decades after he crossed the big divide. Richard Bird Baker has long striven to bring Russells wit, humor, cynicism, and horse sense back to life. In this collection of western yarns, Mr. Baker utilizes Charlie Russell as his early-twentieth-century-styled narrator. He depicts Russell telling yarns in Charlies personal style, utilizing ample dry humor expressed in colorful cowboy lingo. These yarns convey many facets of late-nineteenth-century cowboy life, the good times and the hardships, the joys and sorrows, and above all, the humor and good nature of the western folk icon, the American cowboy. This book is a must for fans of cowboy humor, salty western metaphors, and sagebrush philosophy.

Traditional cowboy lingo, like the old-time maritime vernacular of the sea, and even the jargon of baseball, is so colorfully descriptive that modern, media-molded English sounds bland and trite by comparison. Often a short, cowboy-styled phrase can convey more meaning and sentiment than several paragraphs of modern writ. Thats the heart, soul, and backbone of cowboy poetry. A writer doesnt have to knock his brains out trying to hatch up enough imagery to offset the blandness of modern English, nor does a reader have to scratch his head bald trying to understand the poems.

Will Rogers wrote, "Charlie Russell is the only author a true cowboy can't find fault with." Rogers also considered Charlie America's best story teller, cowboy humorist, and sagebrush philosopher. Though Charlie was under-schooled and semi-literate, his salty Rawhide Rawlins yarns still delight readers almost nine decades after he "crossed the big divide." Richard Baker has long striven to bring Russell's wit, humor, cynicism, and horse sense back to life. In this collection of Western yarns, Mr. Baker utilizes Charlie Russell as his narrator, depicting Charlie telling yarns in his personal style, utilizing ample dry humor expressed in colorful cowboy lingo. These yarns cover many facets of late-nineteenth-century cowboy life, the good times and the hardships, the joys and sorrows, and above all, the humor and good nature of the western folk icon, the American cowboy. This book is a must for fans of cowboy humor, salty western metaphors, and sagebrush philosophy.

"Russell writes easily, and in the vernacular. He tells of Indians and Indian fighters, buffalo hunts, bad men, wolves, wild horses, tough hotels, drinking customs, and hard-riding cowboys. . . . [He] lived long enough in the West to acquire a vast amount of information and lore, and he has left enough from his brush to prove his place as a sound interpreter of a stirring period and a fascinating country".-New York Times. "Russell was the greatest painter who ever painted a range man, a range cow, a range horse, or a Plains Indian. He savvied the cow, the grass, the blizzard, the drought, the wolf, the young puncher in love with his own shadow, the old waddie remembering rides and thirsts of far away and long ago. He was a wonderful storyteller. . . . His subjects were warm with life, whether awake or asleep, at a particular instant, under particular conditions. Trails Plowed Under, prodigally illustrated, is a collection of yarns and ancedotes saturated with humor and humanity".-J. Frank Dobie, Guide to Life and Literature of the Southwest. Brian W. Dippie is a professor of history at the University of Victoria, British Columbia, and the author of Catlin and His Contemporaries: The Politics of Patronage (Nebraska 1990).