November 24, 2008
Kathy and I went up the hill to Prescott on Saturday for a speech I gave at the Phippen Museum (it's near Granite Dells). They are hosting a "Vaqueros & Buffalo Soldiers Art Show" and I spoke to about 45 people on vaqueros and the Buffalo Solders. One of the people who showed up was Bertie Lightfoot who reminded me she is the older sister of Arnold D. Thomas, one of the most notorious bad boys to ever come out of Mohave County. I told Bertie there is a movie called Roadhouse 66 starring Judge Rineholt about fast cars and faster women in Kingman and I swear the bad boy of the piece is based on Arnold D. (someone told me the screenwriter lived in Kingman in the late sixties).

The director of the museum, Kim, and the curator, James, took Kathy and I to dinner at the Bonfire in Chino Valley on Saturday night. Good food and had a great time. The museum put us up at a B&B in Paulden, run by Mark and Marcia Baugher. He is a farrier and we had a nice chat about all things Western. Got home Sunday afternoon and worked on a painting idea for our Jan-Feb cover:



We're doing a feature on the Mexican border and it mentions Jeff Milton, who was an early day border patrol guy. The only difference was in those days they were trying to keep the Chinese out.

I wanted to portray the border area where they have these big, white, stone markers. Here's another take, or study, on the landscape:



Wanted to give Dan The Man a couple designs, and so I did one this morning of the rider being larger. Not finished but here's another take on it:



"They know enough who know how to learn."
—Henry Adams