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Cowboy State Of Mind
by Susan Allen, click here for bio
Program: Open Range
Date: June 08, 10
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Technically cowboys have been around as long a man moved cattle, back to those primitive cave drawings in France, yet today the word has come to describe a cultural movement. I’m Susan Allen, stay tuned for Open Range. So whose the real cowboy? Tie down roper’s I know would say they are because of their ability to handle a wily calf. Does that mean the wrangler on the fancy guest ranch leading the dudes or the country western singer in sequined duds isn’t? Some would say to be authentic you have to doctor cattle from a horse or ride feed lot pens, others believe you must born to the lifestyle, raised in a ranching family to claim the title. Not so, unlike other cultural demographics cowboys come from every social strata, presidents have that have been top hands; Teddy Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan and many an outlaw, like Billy the Kid worked on ranches. Mexican Vaqueros with their silver spurs and braided lariats say they exemplify everything cowboy but so does the guy who puts on his twenty dollar straw hat and goes for a weekend trail ride. I often close Open Range with the Wallace Stegner’s quote “The West isn’t merely a place but a place of mind.” Being a cowboy is a state of mind. There’s a transformation that occurs when a man puts on a cowboy hat, no matter if it’s a taco brim, silver belly or black felt, that fellow stands a little taller. Jack Goddard writes in the book Cattle symbol of the great American West, that the cowboy subculture "is the most intriguing and engrossing movement to ever to appear on this earth." The beauty of it is that it is never to late to Cowboy Up and give it a try. I’m Susan Allen
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