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
The Cowboy Sings: Traditional Songs of the Western Frontier
Kenneth S. Clark
FC 11 C-33
25
Dreary, Dreary Life
A cowboy's life is a dreary, dreary life; Some say it's free from care.
Cowboy Curmudgeon and Other Poems
FC 11 M-45
67
Wallace McRae
Sniffy and Sodie and the Cowboy Code
"Now I ain't scared a' grizzly bears."
Meadow Muffins: Cowboy Rhymes and Other B.S.
FC 11 P-29
20
Mike Puhallo
Price of Respectability
Out in the wild Chilcotin.
Dry Crik Rview: Summer-Fall 1993
John C. Dofflemyer
FC 11 D-20
39
Laurie Wagner Buyer
Into Another Winter
Hay doesn't come the way it used to, bale by bale out of the back of a baler, while the sun stretched out the days, hot and dry, and circling hawks cast
rain, hitch, porch, bridge, calves
Songs of the Saddle and Trails Into Lonesome Land
FC 11 B-19
26
E.A. Brubacher
Lost
Out of a nameless desert.
desert, dry, watering hole, thirst, water, mirage, dry river bed
The Pony Express: An Epic of the Old West
FC 11 M-22
15
Charles Rendell Mabey
The Spirit of the Rider
The riders are dead, their ponies dust,
The Medicine Keepers
FC 11 A-10
11
J.B. Allen
Splinters and Beams
Why is it impossible; For college-educated; Urban-oriented; Despots.
Tumbleweeds and Corral Dust
FC 11 M-25
18
Vern C. Mortensen
Outlaw
I eased up to that pony, easy-like and slow
bronc riding
For Cowboys, Campers an' Common Folk
FC 11 H-19
98
Charlie Hunt
The Living Trees
Are you like the tree in the sunshine.
heart, belief, God, religion, Jesus Christ
Buck Ramsey, Texas Spirit
David Kelley
FOLK COLL 11 R-47
82
Paul Zarzyski
Putting the Rodeo Try into Cowboy Poetry
Let's begin with the wildest landscape, space inhabited by far more of them than our own kind and, yes, we are talking other hearts, other stars.
poetry, love, life
For Cowboys, Campers an' Common Folk
FC 11 H-19
43
Charlie Hunt
Saddle Bronc Rider
I drawed an ol' bronco called "Bank Overdraft."
rodeo, throwed, bucking bronc
Rhymes Along the Way
FC 11 L-39
18
Robert L. Laumeyer
Old Photographs
Ah, music makeres of the past, how sweet your old familiar sound. For it is in your scratchy music my lost boyhood can be found. From "Hallelujah, I'm a Bum", to "When the Work's All Done This Fall", your old verses I hear again, Kerosene lamps I can recall.
Ranch Verses
FC 11 C-09
133
William Lawrence Chittenden
Texas Types -- The Cattle Queen
In the lonely land of Texas.
woman, widow, Mistress Breeze, wealth, bachelor
Time Not Measured by a Clock: Cowboy Poetry from the life of a Cowboy Wife
FC 11 J-14
73
Carole Jarvis
Water, Cows, and Grass
It's water, cows, and grass.
rancher, dreams, cattle, ponds, draw
Poetic Works of Henry Lawson
David McKee Wright
FC 11 L-24
73
Henry Lawson
Peter Anderson and Co.
He had offices in Sydney, not so many years ago.
Brushstrokes & Balladeers: Painters and Poets of the American West
C.J. Hadley
FC 11 H-60
40
S. Omar Barker
What's a Bronco?
They asked me "What's a bronco!" since they seemed to crave to know. I kinder chawed it over, then I fed it to 'em slow. "A bronc," I says,
pioneer, spin, pitch, action, chestnut
75 Years! My Time In Rhyme
FC 11 M-65
81
E.W. "Roy" Miller
The Second Annual National Cowboy Poetry Gathering
The second Cowboy Poetry Gatherin' is now but History; But in the back of my ol'brain, remains this mystery! How could the second gatherin' "hold a candle" to the first? This first one, which we know was great, turned out to be the "worst!" I've tried often in the past,
Hot Biscuits: Eighteen Stories by Women and Men of the Ranching West
Max Evans and Candy Moulton
FC 11 E-14
79
Lori Van Pelt
Natural Causes
On Desert Trails
FC 11 F-03
36
Jewel Finley
Wild Mustang
`Twas a warm day in June all the birds were in tune.
mustang
RU Lazy 2?
FC 11 N-15
11
A.G. Nelson
A Simple Prayer
It's a simple question, We all ask from time to time; What kind of a person, Have I become in my prime?
The Fence That Me and Shorty Built
FC 11 S-49
14
Red Steagall
The Visalia
A friend of mine who raises horses asked if I would stay.
Cowboy Poems and Outright Lies
FC 11 S-44
25
Hal Swift
Them Boys of Ours
Them boys of ours make me so proud.
Rimes O' Round-Up
FC 11 F-08
8
Chester Anders Fee
Jest Hopin'
Whee! Jest to be out in th' hills once more.
outdoors, open air
Horses Women Mountains
FC 11 R-17
39
David Roberts
Rocks
Rocks don't get lonely
The Ranch: Poems of the West
FC 11 L-09
38
Elliott C. Lincoln
Waiting
That steak'll be like leather in a minute.
supper