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
Dry Crik Review (Double Environmental Issue): fall/winter 1992/93, 2 copies
John C. Dofflemyer
FC 11 D-20
101
Jay Dusard
Homo Herbivorus
No rare steak, much gas. Vegetarianism: it's own punishment.
Signature of the Sun: Southwest Verse, 1900-1950
Mabel Major and T.M. Pearce
FC 11 M-02
231
Haniel Long
Song
Why should I have to take the highway?
Saddle Pals
FC 11 S-56
39
Billy Venero
Billy Venero heard them say, in an Arizona one day
Riders of the Stars
FC 11 K-05
6
Henry Herbert Knibbs
Riders Of The Stars
Twenty abreast down the Golden Street ten thousand riders marched.
riders, death, Pearly Gate, stars, night-herding, God,
Saddle Songs: A Cowboy Songbag
Don Edwards
FC 11 E-19
131
Curley Fletcher
Meditation
The soft wind sways the whispering grass; The sun sinks low o'er the western pass As a coyote mingles his dismal howl With the sad, sweet notes of a lone hoot owl.
Songs of the American West
Richard E. Lingenfelter, Richard A. Dwyer and David Cohen
FC 11 L-10
92
John A. Stone
Prospecting Dream
I dreamed a dream the other night, when everything was still.
miner, gold, stealing
Ride The Silence
FC 11 H-58
41
Linda Hussa
Dark Night
In a night of no moon a voice shrieks wildly Never have I heard such a sound. It is startling in its quantity of pain The echo is as grave. The horses run, then whirl.
helpless, empty, tremble, reply, heart
Dry Crik Review (Environmental Issue): Fall 1991
John C. Dofflemyer
FC 11 D-20
36
Katie Lee
All My Rivers Are Gone
My place was yours for a time time. You force on time a measure--live within units, segments, compartments, limits--Taking the joy and pain of today,
future, desire, clean, Twentieth Century, scoriform, stones
Tales of the Old West
Bane K. Wilker
FC 11 W-33 v. 4 no. 2
17
Rane Arroyo
March
The black tree has never heard the sea. It is busy shivering. Until spring. Then it pumps life to limbs as numb as islands.
An Ol' Cowboy Still Remembers?and Other Cowboy Poems
FC 11 E-12
37
Glen Enloe
Ol' Spud
I'll be ridin' the trail alone these days, The years have caught up with my bud.
Cowboy Poetry: Rhymes, Reasons, and Pack Saddle Proverbs by Chris Isaacs
Janice Coggins
FC 11 I-02
20
Chis Isaacs
Antiques
It was just an old stirrup that I found in a box.
Poetic Works of Henry Lawson
David McKee Wright
FC 11 L-24
226
Henry Lawson
The City Bushman
It was pleasant up the country.
"Originals"
FC 11 S-16
59
J.D. Santee
Strangers We Are
Strangers we were when we met,
Sawdust & Shavin's
FC 11 S-11
16
Shep Smith
Late Again
Our Man of Compunction
Exchanging Courtesies
FC 11 S-57
86
Marie W. Smith
Reunion
short story
Wind and the Night Monsters
FC 11 H-24
4
Carol Hample
A Walk In The Dark
I still remember well one night some fifty years ago, when Johnny Hardenbrook and I were boys of twelve or so. The night was black as pitch with heavy clouds, but fairly still, and warm enough to walk to Sun Creek Ranch across the hill.
Our West to You
Idaho Writers League
FC 11 I-01
1
Alma Hanson
Winning the West
The fair western terrain was not won in a moon.
settlers, settlement, history, past
Bell-Bottoms to Boots
FC 11 W-07
139
Joe "Blackie" Wilson
Take What Comes
It takes all kind of people to make a world.
Letters from Elko
FC 11 P-28
16
Scott Preston
Peggy
the child you held inside you.
Blood Writing
Sean Sexton
FOLK COLL 11 S-75
27
Sean Sexton
Feed
Everything in the world clamours for it.
feed, grain, storage
Rhymes of Today and Yesterday!
FC 11 G-17
57
June Brander Gilman
Thinking of Kay
I still shed a tear thought it's been almost a year.
Rimes O' Round-Up
FC 11 F-08
11
Chester Anders Fee
Call for a Horse
Give me a hoss that ain't been rode.
bucking, horse, bronc busting
Poems by Skinny
FC 11 R-41
19
Skinny Rowland
Flatlanders
Way down there form our moutains, those flatland slickers dwell, and once I took a trip down there, now I have this tale to t
Songs of the Outlands: Ballads of the Hoboes and Other Verse
FC 11 K-07
71
Henry Herbert Knibbs
For the Wind is Never Hushing
O mother, little mother, 't is a weary way before me!
Cowboy Poetry: Cloud Watchers
FC 11 F-16
292
Rolf M. Flake
Railroad Job
Well, the railroad crossed this little ranch Up Navajo County way. The rancher had a damage clain Which the railroad refused to pay. The rancher had tried to no avail To bring the company to "heel"-- But the railroad refused adamantly-- They wanted to part of a deal.