Western Books

I have often read that Owen Wister's publishing of The Virginian, 115 years ago this week, on May 28, 1902, was the start of Westerns in America.  Nice that the setting was Wyoming, which was still pretty new and still a bit wild at that time. But that was not the first western, not even close. Long before the beginning of the 1900s were the Dime Novel Westerns, sometimes shortened to Dime Westerns.

Elk Mountain as seen from the town of Medicine Bow
the setting for the start of Wister's, The Virginian

The Dime Westerns became popular shortly after the Civil War spanning a time period of nearly 40 years before the publication of, The Virginian. The books were short, almost always less than 100 pages, and priced at a dime or 15 cents. These books centered on fictional escapades of real people, many of the settings were, Wyoming, Texas, Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma and Montana.  Mountain Men, Indians, Soldiers and Bad Guys of all kind made up the many characters of these books. Later, a smaller format, adopted for magazines became popular, these were all set to the standard length of 32 pages.

Today westerns make up less than one percent of the overall book market – so what happened? Maybe, not much. If a reader looks, it is easy to find westerns today, just not the old tired, fake Wild West type of story. 

This is my modern day, set in WyomingYoung Adult or Adult Western Mystery

Suspense-Thrillers and Mystery-Detective along with books classified as Young Adult dominate today's best seller lists. I write books I classify as western-mysteries, some set before 1900 and some in modern time. I still read westerns today, some are thrillers, some mysteries, and some suspense, but all are set in the west.

Guess the Western is not dead, it just lost its singular classification, maybe the old time shoot-um-ups died in the street with their boots on, but today great western stories can be found in just about any popular genre.

Here is a link to my books on Amazon – four of these books could fall into the western category. Click on any of the books and read a free sample.

The second of my Blade Holmes Westen Mysteries
Cover photo from Fort Laramie - each book has Fort Laramie settings.

Oldest House in Wyoming

Did you know the oldest house in the world is in Wyoming? This may not be a completely accurate statement but it is true if you look at this house the way I do. How do I look at it? I look at the building material not the structure itself.

How old is it? This is why it is the oldest, it is 150,000,000 years old, maybe more. The house was built of dinosaur bones from one of many digs at nearby Como Bluff. 

The Bluff is near the small Wyoming village of Medicine Bow, the town made famous in Owen Wister’s, “The Virginian.”

Como Bluff Area

Como Bluff digs have yielded bones of hundreds of dinosaurs, included two of the most complete skeletons ever found. One of many remains found here was the famous thunder lizard, Brontosaurus, the 75 foot long amphibious Sauropod.

Brontosaurus-Rex

I have always found the idea of dinosaurs roaming Wyoming and other parts of the earth fascinating, but I know very little about them. I am learning more from my grand-kids every time they visit and we watch, Walking With Dinosaurs.

Seems kids like to study the giant animals. I do not think we spent much time, maybe no time at all studying dinosaurs when I was in elementary school, maybe I was daydreaming of recess at the time. It was a long, long time ago when I was in elementary school, perhaps dinosaurs were still walking around at the time and not that interesting to study.

Using the Medicine Wood

 Medicine Bow is one of the most impressive mountains in south eastern Wyoming. The Mountain, most often called, Medicine Bow Peak, is part of  a small range called the Medicine Bow's. Nearby is the tiny village of Medicine Bow and Medicine Bow River.

Took This Shot of Medicine Bow Peak Last Sunday

Where did the name Medicine Bow come from? Good solid birch trees that made terrific hunting bows for native peoples roaming and hunting the area. Many different woods and even the antlers of big horn sheep and elk were used in various parts of the west to make hunting bows. The Birch wood found along today's Medicine Bow River must have made exceptional bows. So good they said it was, “good medicine,” the medicine wood.

Powerful Animals Took a Powerful Bow

 See the town of Medicine Bow here - http://www.medicinebow.org

Medicine Bow Wyoming

Spent last Saturday in Medicine Bow Wyoming—Medicine Bow Days and a celebration of 100 years for the Virginian Hotel. The Hotel was built to be the showcase place to stay between Denver and Salt Lake; it is still going strong and quite a neat old place. Watched some fast draw competition, bought the grand kids snow-cones, and had an all round great time.