"I've known about Ike Blasingame all my life, knew many of his fellow punchers, white and Indian. Ike was certainly a salty representative of the Texas bronc twister when he came North with that most romantic of cow outfits, the British-owned Matador. . . . [He] takes the reader across the treacherous Missouri River as the spring-softened ice goes out under the horses' feet, into the still wild cow towns, through the round-ups, the prairie fires. . . . There is the authentic smell and feel of the Northern cow country of fifty years ago in the story Ike Blasingame tells."-Mari Sandoz"Here is one of the most gripping Western tales since Andy Adams' The Log of a Cowboy was published in 1903. The telling is considerably like Adams'-warm, human, flavorful. The author, a one-time Matador ranch cowboy, . . . lived his story, and he tells it straight in the language of the cow country without contrivance."-New York Times"Many of the cowboys who have written about their experiences never really looked at any wider segment of the cattle business than was visible between their horses' ears, but Ike Blasingame did. He paints a big picture without omitting details."-New York Herald-Tribune

Compelling narrative by a real-life cowboy traces the events of an 1882 cattle drive, during which 3,000 longhorns traversed the Great Western Cattle Trail from Brownsville, Texas, to Montana.

Up The Trail - Receiving - The Start - The Atascosa - A Dry Drive - A Reminiscent Night - The Colorado - On The Brazos And Wichita - Doan's Crossing - No Man's Land - A Boggy Ford - The North Fork - Dodge - Slaughter's Bridge - The Beaver - The Republican - Ogalalla - The North Platte - Forty Islands Ford - A Moonlight Drive - The Yellowstone - Our Last Camp-Fire - Delivery - Back To Texas - Illustrations: The Stampede - Map Showing The Trail - Heat And Thirst - Meeting With Indians - Celebrating In Dodge - Story-Telling - Swimming The Platte

Rattlesnakes and ornery horses, the dreaded Texas Itch, midnight rambles in graveyards, trips to Mexico, and hard riding on the last open range: George Philip recounts all these adventures and more with wit and humour. George Phillip arrived in South Dakota from Scotland in 1899. For the next four years, he rode as a cowboy for his uncle's L-7 cattle outfit during the heyday of the last open range. But the cowboy era was a brief one, and in 1903 Philip turned in his string of horses and hung up his saddle to enter law school in Michigan. In these candid letters, Philip provides fascinating insights into the development of the West and of South Dakota. His writing details the cowboy's day-to-day work, from branding and roping to navigating across the palins by stars and buttes, as the great open ranges slowly closed up.

This contemporary cowboy journal reveals the rituals and labors of daily cowboy life in the Texas Panhandle, from 1979-1981. The author, nationally known for his Hank the Cowdog series, continues to recount stories about the well known characters and places of his previous works. The hard times of struggling through a depressed cattle market, drought, sickness, injuries, and inclement weather are balanced with humorous tales of steer and human antics. Contains a short glossary of cowboy terms. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

No one is better suited to convey the flavor of the Old West than this authentic American original. At age 13, in the 1930s, Hyde ran away from home in Michigan to his uncle's ranch in eastern Oregon. Yamsi was one of the last great cattle ranches of the West. Soon the boy won 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. After the war, he took Yamsi over, ensuring its survival in changing times. Now, half a century later, he gives us his valedictory to that last great period of the Old West. Full of humor, rollicking stories, and love of the land, he pays homage to the cowboys, Indians, and great horses who made the West the legend it is.--From publisher description.