FOLK COLLECTION 11: The Skaggs Foundation Cowboy Poetry Collection
Folk Coll 11 is Utah State University's cowboy poetry collection. The collection, originally created
by a generation donation by the L. J. and Mary Skaggs Foundation, includes books gathered
during a fieldwork project in the early 1980s to document cowboy poetry in the U.S. west (see Folk
Coll 11f). From this important fieldwork project came the impetus for the first Cowboy Poetry Gathering held in
January 1985 in Elko, Nevada. Since that time, each January, the Fife Folklore Archives staff take the collection
and Access database (that details each book, poem, author, first line and key words), to the National Cowboy Poetry
Gathering for offsite use. Through University purchases and generation donations from poets and collectors, this collection continues to grow.
Book Title
Composer
Call #
Pages
Author
Poem Title
First Lines
Keywords
A Cowboy's Forty Years of Gathering
FC 11 D-03
32
Chet Dawson
Letter to a Friend
Dear Brad I hear you've had them doctor fellers guessin'.
doctor, profession, medicine, antibiotics, health, veterinarian
What I Learned On the Way to Life: Insights and Concepts learned along the way..
FC 11 J-15
109
Hans "Jake" Jeppson
Had I Known You Then
Had I known you then and brought a rose.
One Hundred Poems
Waddie Mitchell
FOLK COLL 11 M-73
76
Waddie Mitchell
There's Nothing Like Nothing
'Twas their fourteenth Christmas together 'Cept for the kids, didn't have much to show For the life he'd spent ridin' for cattle And he was feeling especially low
christmas, gifts, wife
Poems, Facts and Fiction
FC 11 O-03
51
Harold Otto
To Bill the Bull Cook
At the cook house near Pateros where the food is the best, there's a bull cook named Bill who gets darn little rest.
Almost a Cowboy: A Biography in Verse
FC 11 W-24
10
Jane Webecke
Missouri Meals
Rhubarb and turnips.
Intermountain Folk: Songs of Their Days & Ways
FC 11 S-04
58
E. Richard Shipp
City
Yesterday a Man failed
You're Gonna Get a Kick Outta This!
FC 11 L-28
69
Chuck Larsen
The Perfect Tree
Well, when it comes to Christmas; I'm a Buh-humbug kinda guy.
Country Feelings: A Collection of Poems
FC 11 G-14
8
Gordon Green
Unspoken Gratitude
If not for you I would not be all that I have become.
friendship, friend, faith, support, need
Rough Rhymes of Reverence
FC 11 N-05
1
Jimmie Nelson
Men Who Walk With God
While searching for men, other than the clergy who may walk with God
The Song of the Hunter
FC 11 L-40
10
Robert L. Laumeyer
A Drifting Cloud
The old man watched the cloud drift along, In the clear blue sky it did not belong. As he watched the cloud near the rim, He thought how much the cloud, was like him. In life, no other anchor of faith had he earned
Missouri Cowboy Poetry
Leroy Watts
FC 11 M-46
26
Arnold "Buzz" Benson
The Death of Dakota Belle
Many long years ago, Ol' Buddy, we awoke to the cold and gray.
Songs from the Sage Brush
FC 11 P-03
53
Katherine Fall Pettey
The Cowpunch Converted
I hit the trail for the lonesome town, On a shiny and Sunday morn
More Rhymes of a Ranch Hand
FC 11 L-06
17
Frank D. Lemon
With All Due Apologies
Mill, trouble shooter is Tom Dickerson.
Coolin' Down: An Anthology of Contemporary Cowboy Poetry
Phil Martin
FC 11 M-53
34
Bill Larsen
God's Summer Range
The grass grows thick in this mountain crick, the cows and sheep like it fine
Cowboy Poetry: Horse Tracks Through The Sage
FC 11 H-47
116
Sunny Hancock
A Sailors Lament
It was once that I was happy, And my life was filled with cheer, And I ain't never been to Texas, 'Till the Navy brought me here. I'd heard songs about her beauty, Her pretty girls and big strong men, Her oil wells and seashorees, And rollin' plains laid end to end.
The Big Roundup: Classic and Contemporary Poetry from CowboyPoetry.com
Margo Metegrano
FC 11 M-47
198
Roger L. Traweek
The Home Place
I stopped at the old home place today to pass a little time.
Pioneer Poetry and Prose
FC 11 S-67
7
Rhoda Cosgrave Sivell
Calgary, Queen of the golden west
I never loved the city life.
Brushstrokes & Balladeers: Painters and Poets of the American West
C.J. Hadley
FC 11 H-60
26
Rod Miller
Migrations
I hear them in the evening winging northward- their eager, maybe longing, kind of sound. It reminds me that we'll soon
calves, skies, echoes, urgent, cries
Yesterday's Trails
FC 11 N-07
5
Howard L. Norskog
Little Moccasins
The morning mists creep over the land and down through the flower and trees the teepees stark against the sky catch winds that are wild and free
Buckaroo Ballads
FC 11 B-04
92
S. Omar Barker
On the Mesa Trail
Oh, a white, white horse for a red-haired lass, (And a pinto for her cowboy lover--).
love, lover, girlfriend, boyfriend, romance
Confessions of A Cowboy Poet
FC 11 C-52
140
Bob Christensen
Christmas 2007 "Alone for Christmas"
She's just a wee bit shy of thirty with three kids all under ten and she's learning fast the workings of a place. She was raised up in the city then became a country wife so she's running hard to keep up the pace.
Rhymes of the Range Land
FC 11 J-04
47
Bob Johnston
A Special Sunrise
The sunrise came again this morning.
beauty, outdoors, environment, sun, contentment, happiness, time
Poems of American Cowboys & Nature
FC 11 C-04
92
Bob A. Carson
A Dream
I dreampt sic I saw great herds around me stand.
More Muddled Meanderings in an Outhouse
FC 11 R-13
50
Bob Ross
Sure We're Modern
It's nice and warm as a rule
Songs from the Sage Brush
FC 11 P-03
62
Katherine Fall Pettey
Destiny
I build a fire with the wood of To Be! I put on the caldron of Fate