The Log of a Cowboy (Bison Book) [Paperback]

Andy Adams (Author), E. Boyd Smith (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1985 | Series: Bison Book

What are the connections between cattle branding and Christian salvation, between livestock castration and square dancing, between cattle rustling and the making of spurs and horsehair bridles in prison, between children's coloring books and cowboy poetry as it is practiced today? The Cowboy uses literary, historical, folkloric, and pop and cultural sources to document ways in which cowboys address religion, gender, economics, and literature. Arguing that cowboys are defined by the work they do, Allmendinger sets out in each chapter to investigate one form of labor (such as branding, castration, or rustling) in the cowboy's "work culture." He looks at early oral poems recited around campfires, on trail drives, at roundups, and at home in ranch bunkhouses, and at later poems, histories, and autobiographies written by cowboys about their work - most of which have never before received scholarly attention. Allmendinger shows how these texts address larger concerns than the work at hand - including art, morality, spirituality, and male sexuality. In addition to spotlighting little-known texts, art, and archival sources, The Cowboy examines the works of Mark Twain, John Steinbeck, Willa Cather, Louis L'Amour, Larry McMurtry, and others. Unique among studies of the American cowboy, Allmendinger's study looks at what cowboys thought of themselves, and the ways in which they represented those thoughts in their own prose, poetry, and artifacts. Richly illustrated with photographs of cowboys at work and at play, many previously unpublished, The Cowboy will interest scholars of American literature and history, and American Studies, as well as those interested in Western history and culture,folklore, and gender studies.

Editorial Reviews

Review

""The Log of a Cowboy" is the finest piece of literature that the cattle-country has produced." - Douglas Branch in "The Cowboy and His Interpreters". "If all other books on trail-driving were destroyed, a reader could get an authentic conception of trail men, trail work, range cattle, cow horses, and the cow country in general from "The Log of a Cowboy"." - J. Frank Dobie. "As a narrative of cowboy life, Andy Adams' book is clearly the real thing. It carries its own certificate of authentic first-hand experience on every page." - Chicago Herald. "Since the movie producers have little regard for actuality, we must look to literature to preserve the truth of the cattle trail era for us... Andy Adams did it excellently well when he wrote "The Log of a Cowboy". Adams spent twelve years in the saddle in Texas. He began writing when broke after seeing a ludicrous and false depiction of cattle-range life... "The Log of a Cowboy" is the work of a realist." - "The New Republic".

About the Author

Andy Adams (1859–1935) was born to pioneer parents in Indiana, worked in Texas for ten years driving cattle, and settled in Colorado Springs, where he began writing his “real” stories of cowboys in the West.

Richard W. Etulain is professor emeritus of history and former director of the Center for the American West at the University of New Mexico. He has authored or edited more than forty books. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 397 pages
• Publisher: University of Nebraska Press; Unabridged Edition. edition (May 1985)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0803250002
• ISBN-13: 978-0803250000
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,447,833 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best of this genre, April 8, 1998

By 

[e-mail] (Placerville, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Log of a Cowboy (Bison Book) (Paperback)

This book is a lot of fun to read, taking the reader back in time to a late-1800s cattle drive from Texas to Montana. The book is written well with spare prose, wit and exceptional details about a cowboy's often difficult and sometimes boring life on the trail. There's refreshingly little of the syrup found in so many western stories. It's written simply enough for pre-teens interested in the west, yet it will yield a lot of enjoyment for the seasoned reader.

29 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One for the "Lonesome Dove" bookshelf, August 20, 2003

By 

Ronald Scheer "rockysquirrel" (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Log of a Cowboy: A Narrative of the Old Trail Days (Paperback)

Andy Adams was a prolific writer, and thanks to the University of Nebraska Press, some of this former cowboy's output is still in print. This true-to-life story of an 1882 cattle drive is his best known, and its retelling 100 years later in Larry McMurtry's "Lonesome Dove" is evidence of its importance among early works of Western fiction.

Here the protagonist is a young cowboy much like the author, who trailed beef from Texas to Montana at a time just after the buffalo herds were being extinguished from the short grass prairies and homesteading had not yet fenced in the high plains. Oklahoma was still "Indian Territory," Little Big Horn was a recent memory, and Native Americans were in the last shameful stages of being forced off the open rangeland. The railroads were snaking across the land making frontier boom towns where law and order either prevailed (Dodge) or more often did not (Ogallala), and the vast cattle herds of Texas and Mexico finally had a market and access to it.

Adams was born into this world and as a young man cowboyed during the height of the cattle drive era. His book is an account of one trek, delivering 3,000 head of cattle to the Blackfoot Agency in northern Montana. For the protagonist, the initial excitement wears off once the daily routine is established, and besides the occasional stampede and wet weather, the highlights of the journey are brief visits to the cowtowns they pass along the way and the many river crossings, some of which pose enormous difficulties.

We get to know all the men in the outfit by name, and a few stand out, including Flood the foreman, McCann the cook, and the protagonist's trail mate The Rebel, who is older and wiser and something of a mentor. Other personalities emerge, primarily around the campfire on nights when the men get to swapping stories. And Adams passes on a lot of first-hand knowledge about trailing cattle, riding horses, and the day-to-day operation of a drive. Days and nights of the routine are punctuated by episodes of another kind: a rigged horse race, in which the cowboys lose several hundred dollars in wagers, two saloon shootings, the breakdown of the chuck wagon, pulling cattle out of a boggy river, meeting potentially hostile Indians, an encounter with cattle thieves, and a long drive across a waterless expanse of Wyoming.

Reproduced from the original edition published in 1903, the text has an old fashioned look and feel that suit the subject matter and the prose style well. There are also five illustrations. I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoyed "Lonesome Dove." Adams captures the excitement and the reality of the old West before it was romanticized and mythologized by the movies and popular fiction. As companion volumes, I would recommend Ramon Adams' "Cowboy Lingo" and "Come an' Get It," which provide much informative background on open range cowboying. With a good road atlas at hand, you're also able to follow the track of the drive across six western states, from Brownsville to the Blackfeet Indian Reservation.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Truer than Lonsesome Dove and just as good!, December 30, 2003

By 

Travis C. Ward "C. William Anderson" (Silverton, OR United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Log of a Cowboy: A Narrative of the Old Trail Days (Paperback)

I have found this to be one of the best western books ever written. Written 100 years ago it has the feel of life in the late 1800s not glossed or romanticized.

If you're interested in this book take a look also at the website westwardho dot us. Although they don't intend to print fiction, they are thinking about making an exception for this terrific title. Why?

The folks at westwardho say, "Log of a cowboy is so near to truth that it is hard to call it fiction. It certainly is more true to life than some of the news articles written in the recent past!"

I appreciate much of the modern miracles we take for granted - internet, mobile (cellular) phones, satellite TV and the ability to produce tremendous, special-effects driven movies. Still, I wonder if we are missing something in all our instant self-gratification lifestyle...

Don't get me wrong, I am not one to call the old days the good days. We not only have more luxury today, we also have more opportunity and greater political and intellectual freedom. I am merely trying to point out that many of us fail to seize opportunity and fail to recognize the value of our more primitive instincts.

Read THE LOG OF A COWBOY and see if you don't also wonder. Then also try finding a copy of Africa's equal, MEMORIES OF A GAME RANGER. If you also will peruse my ABOUT Me profile at Amazon's book reviews and you'll find a few more gems you probably never heard of but that you will thoroughly enjoy - Bill Anderson.