Hohokam Wall Art

November 30, 2011

Excellent design meeting this morning with Dan The Man Harshberger, Robert Ray, Abbby Goodrich, Meghan Saar and Allison Carlton. Solved a bunch of problems on a variety of fronts and dealt with some that are still kicking our patooties, but we'll get there. Here's a posed shot of us pretending to work on the wall, after lunch, and after Dan had gone back into the Beast to work on the layouts from his studio. The only person not faking it is Abby, second from right, who appears to be totally disgusted by what she sees (full disclosure, she may have been looking at my fingernails).

Went home for lunch and whipped out an illustration of Hohokam farmers doing their thing in the Salt River Valley. Copied an ancient pottery motif off a famous pot, but couldn't resist adding Hohokam cleavage and farmer tan Hohokams:

"Civilization is the limitless multiplication of unnecessary necessities."
—Mark Twain

Arizona Statehood vs. The Grand Canyon (A Period Piece)

November 30, 2011

Here's a period piece, literally. For our centennial issue I want to illustrate how tiny the period of Arizona statehood is, vs. the forming of the Grand Canyon. I woke up this morning and whipped out these little Anasazi-Hohokam type figures pointing at the puny, insignificant part of the timeline where human inhabitants in this region began.

And the punchline is that if you drew a line from New York City to Phoenix, Arizona to represent how long it took to carve the Grand Canyon (hint: some 17 million years), the amount of time Arizona has been a state would be represented by the period at the end of this sentence.

That's what they are pointing at—the period, in a period piece.

Hope it tracks in the article. Dan The Man Harshberger is coming out at 11 for a big graphics design meeting. In addition to our 20-page centennial package, Dan is redesigning all of our departments and it is a herculean effort for the staff, converting, editing and tweaking everything. Thanks to Ken Amorosano, we have dedicated an entire wall in our conference room to this effort. We were inspired by a Hearst documentary we saw online, that showed how the staff of a new launch magazine critiqued and redesigned spreads right up to press time by pinning the pages up on the wall and arguing about flow. That was inspiring and it is now part of our regimen.

Hope to have one more pass before it all goes to the printer on Friday. Half the staff is already gone to Las Vegas for Cowboy Christmas. We have a booth at Mandalay Bay. I am going over a week from tomorrow. If you are in the neighborhood I hope you stop by and say howdy.

"You are richer for doing things."
—Jessica Tandy

The Legend of Red Ghost

November 29, 2011

One of the enduring, outrageous legends in Arizona is that a demonic, rogue camel with a skeleton on its back, killed and terrorized the country side for a decade in the 1880s. The "Red Ghost" was allegedly finally killed in a rancher's garden in eastern Arizona.

Going into the Beast today for a cardio doctor's appointment and then down to Arizona West Gallery to shoot some photos for a piece we're doing on the Top Ten Arizona Paintings. A Remington ("Fight for The Water Hole") is worth abut $7 million, but the Thomas Moran is worth $100 mil. Amazing.

"All good things that exist are the fruits of originality."
—John Stuart Mill

A Bridge of Blood Too Far?

November 28, 2011

Our art director, Dan The Man Harshberger rejected the cover I posted this morning, saying it didn't show any emotion and there is no blood on the cowboy. So I went home for lunch and tweaked it.

Now, I'm worried I pushed it too bloody far!

"Good communication is as stimulating as black coffee, and just as hard to sleep after."

—Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Pusillanimity at the O.K. Corral

November 28, 2011

Had a very nice weekend with family. On Saturday morning, Tommy's girlfriend Pattarapan made Thai huevos rancheros for all of us and they were spectacular. Great talk afterwards about all things to be thankful for. Love this quote from a new book I read about over the weekend:

"An animal that eats and thinks must think big about what it is eating and not to be taken for an animal."
—Adam Gopnik, in his new book, "The Table Comes First: Family, France and the Meaning of Food"

Final stretch on centennial package for our February Arizona Statehood issue. Worked all weekend on several art approaches both for cover and inside feature.

Debating two titles: "The Outrageous History of Arizona From The Beginning of Time to Statehood," or, "Outrageous Arizona" with a subhed, "From the beginning of time to statehood."

Does anyone remember the comedy bit about taking a surprise pop quiz in high school and the question has a word in it (I think it was "moribund") that destroys your ability to answer and so the comic does this imitation of a hapless student padding out the answer, by first re-asking the question, "The problem with moribund is a question that has. . ." and then the comic turns the page because he's writing real big to fill space. Who was that comedian? Stein-something? I can just see him. Anyway, I was reading a review of the new book "Civilization: The West and the Rest," by Niall Ferguson, and he has this great quote:

"The biggest threat to Western civilization is posed not by other civilizations, but by our own pusillanimity—and by the historical ignorance that feeds it."

Okay, I was thrown by that one word, which by the way, I looked up and it means "timid," or "lacking courage."

"Knowledge is proud that it knows so much; wisdom is humble that it knows no more."—William Cowper

Sistine Chapel Version of the O.K. Corral Fight

November 23, 2011

Went home for lunch and actually got my lunch on the sketches I was working on (yes, that's bar-b-q sauce stains in the sky).

This is a poach from Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel creation scene. Only here we have the birth of the O.K. Corral legend which sent Arizona's fame "swirling to the frontier skies in clouds of six-shooter smoke."

Meanwhile, for the opening spread of the centennial piece I want to extend this metaphor to the birth of Arizona, building on gunfighters in the clouds and Apaches running through the Grand Canyon at the bottom chased by Spanish conquistadors and red camels with skeletons on their backs.

Studying Michelangelo's prep drawings I came up with these figures I want to plant at the bottom in the shadows of the canyon:

Very ambitious, even for me. Going to have to execute it this weekend. Going to need some luck, although I love what the Prairie Home Companion Dude has to say about it:

"Some luck lies in not getting what you thought you wanted but getting what you have, which once you have got it you may be smart enough to see is what you would have wanted had you known."
—Garrison Keillor

The Lost Dutchman Was German

November 23, 2011

Big pow wow at the True West World Headquarters yesterday. Arizona's most awarded journalist, Jana Bommersbach was here; and Arizona's Official State Historian Marshall Trimble was here; and Dan The Man Harshberger (former treasurer of the Wickenburg Clown Club), Editor in Chief Meghan Saar, True West Publisher Ken Amorosano and me (former president of the Wickenburg Clown Club).

Jana did some editing and pruning of our massive coverage, while Marsh added some Ashfork style zane (a taste: "The first white man in Arizona was a black man, The Lost Dutchman was German, the first Arizona cowboy film star was a woman and Navajo fry bread was created by a Greek. . .").

Still working on the cover image. Here's a sketch from yesterday:

And here's another study I whipped out last week:

Woke up at two this morning with a concept: The birth of Arizona as seen from the Sistine Chapel. Sketches to follow this afternoon.

"In a museum in Havana, there are two skulls of Christopher Columbus, 'one when he was a boy and one when he was a man'."
—Mark Twain

Cubism Meets Ed Mell-ism at The O.K. Corral

November 22, 2011

If Oklahoma is called the OK state, then Arizona is the O.K. Corral state. It certainly is the signature image in my mind. It represents all the things I love about the place: drunk dentists, well-armed cowboys, outlaw horses, well heeled pimps and windy dust-ups.

Been noodling a cover idea. You can call this Cubism Meets Ed Mell-ism at The O.K. Corral:

Need more Ed Mell color and geometric shapes, but this could be a good one. Got a good Clanton grimacing sketch, but finished the Earp shooter and came into the office to work on the centennial material. Big meeting at noon today. Jana Bommersbach, Marshall Trimble, Dan the Man Harshberger are coming out for a big pow wow on the new design.

"That Wyatt Earp and crew willfully, feloniously, premeditatedly and of malice of aforethought killed William Clanton, Thomas McLuary and Frank McLaury."
—paraphrased murder complaint filed by Ike Clanton on February 9, 1882

O.K. Aftermath: Not So O.K.

November 21, 2011

Working on the aftermath of the O.K. Corral fight for our centennial coverage. Plenty of heartache all around. it certainly spelled tragedy for both sides, with ambushes and counter strikes (it's no wonder early scribes referred to it as the "Earp-Clanton Feud.") And, of course, it plays out entirely different than the movies where the Earps have saved the town from outlawry and are greeted as conquering heroes. This did happen, but for only about two hours. From Doc Holliday sitting on his bed in Fly's weeping (Kate's remembrance) to the Earps and all of their supporters being trounced at the next election, the real history plays out at a 180 degree tilt AWAY from the legend.

After the Spicer Hearing exonerated them, it's interesting to note the Tombstone town council did not reappoint Virgil as chief of police, and the business community withdrew their support, at least privately, based on all the negative national publicity that the fight had generated. The Earps became pariahs to the business interests and their friends suffered as well. John Clum was depressed at the money hole the Tombstone Epitaph had become (not hard for me to imagine) and being so closely associated with the Earps he knew his days as mayor were numbered as well.

We're doing a Size Matters: The Tombstone Edition, and in addition to Texas John Slaughter at the short end (5'3"?) we have Sheriff Bob Paul at 6'4". When it comes to the cowboys in the O.K Corral fight, I just got this from a historian who has researched the McLaurys at length:

"When I first met the grand-nieces of Tom and Frank, they told me ALL the McLaurys were short. That opinion has since been confirmed by other relatives that I've met (all of whom were under 5'6). Billy Clanton was over 6' tall. He may have been 6'1" or even 6'2" If you look at the coffin photo, note that Billy's coffin is longer both at the top and bottom than the one next to him (Tom). Tom was probably about 5'5" or 5'6". Frank (coffin on the left) was shorter than his brother by about two inches (5'3" or 5'4"). This is borne out by the photo in Jack Ganzhorn's book "I've Killed Men" of the two McLaurys (standing) and Ed Finerty (seated). Although that photo is disputed (it's provenance is cloudy and the original has never been located that I know of), I believe it is the McLaurys in the photo. Frank (on the right) is clearly the shorter brother. Finerty, a tall man himself, was seated between them.

"Now picture 5'11" Wyatt Earp towering over 5'5 or 6" Tom and walloping him over the head. Earp had a physical advantage as well as the element of surprise. Does that make Frank's reluctance to give up his gun more understandable?"—Paul Johnson

I seem to remember Bat Masterson describing Wyatt as being six foot, but perhaps 5'11" is more accurate to the times.

Of course, everyone was shorter in those days, so someone like Bob Paul at six foot four must have been quite imposing.

"An officer must rely almost entirely upon his own conscience for encouragement. The sympathy of the respectable portion of the community may be with him, but it is not openly expressed."
—Virgil Earp, being interviewed after leaving Tombstone

O.K. Aftermath: Not So O.K.

November 21, 2011

Working on the aftermath of the O.K. Corral fight for our centennial coverage. Plenty of heartache all around. it certainly spelled tragedy for both sides, with ambushes and counter strikes (it's no wonder early scribes referred to it as the "Earp-Clanton Feud.") And, of course, it plays out entirely different than the movies where the Earps have saved the town from outlawry and are greeted as conquering heroes. This did happen, but for only about two hours. From Doc Holliday sitting on his bed in Fly's weeping (Kate's remembrance) to the Earps and all of their supporters being trounced at the next election, the real history plays out at a 180 degree tilt AWAY from the legend.

After the Spicer Hearing exonerated them, it's interesting to note the Tombstone town council did not reappoint Virgil as chief of police, and the business community withdrew their support, at least privately, based on all the negative national publicity that the fight had generated. The Earps became pariahs to the business interests and their friends suffered as well. John Clum was depressed at the money hole the Tombstone Epitaph had become (not hard for me to imagine) and being so closely associated with the Earps he knew his days as mayor were numbered as well.

We're doing a Size Matters: The Tombstone Edition, and in addition to Texas John Slaughter at the short end (5'3"?) we have Sheriff Bob Paul at 6'4". When it comes to the cowboys in the O.K Corral fight, I just got this from a historian who has researched the McLaurys at length:

"When I first met the grand-nieces of Tom and Frank, they told me ALL the McLaurys were short. That opinion has since been confirmed by other relatives that I've met (all of whom were under 5'6). Billy Clanton was over 6' tall. He may have been 6'1" or even 6'2" If you look at the coffin photo, note that Billy's coffin is longer both at the top and bottom than the one next to him (Tom). Tom was probably about 5'5" or 5'6". Frank (coffin on the left) was shorter than his brother by about two inches (5'3" or 5'4"). This is borne out by the photo in Jack Ganzhorn's book "I've Killed Men" of the two McLaurys (standing) and Ed Finerty (seated). Although that photo is disputed (it's provenance is cloudy and the original has never been located that I know of), I believe it is the McLaurys in the photo. Frank (on the right) is clearly the shorter brother. Finerty, a tall man himself, was seated between them.

"Now picture 5'11" Wyatt Earp towering over 5'5 or 6" Tom and walloping him over the head. Earp had a physical advantage as well as the element of surprise. Does that make Frank's reluctance to give up his gun more understandable?"



—Paul Johnson

I seem to remember Bat Masterson describing Wyatt as being six foot, but perhaps 5'11" is more accurate to the times.

Of course, everyone was shorter in those days, so someone like Bob Paul at six foot four must have been quite imposing.

"An officer must rely almost entirely upon his own conscience for encouragement. The sympathy of the respectable portion of the community may be with him, but it is not openly expressed."

—Virgil Earp

The True West Aerobus

November 21, 2011

I have a neighbor, Matt Grace, who has a bunch of tricked out bikes and cars. I often see him on Old Stage Road stylin' with muscle cars and chopped bikes of all kinds. In fact, it's kind of a daily treat: "What the hell is Matt drivin' today?"

Earlier this year Matt dropped by and showed me a couple photos of his latest find, a 1970 Checker Marathon Aerobus. He told me only 3,000 were ever made and most ended up rusted out because of east coast usage. But, this one is cherry, and he says he got it from an Asian collector on the West Coast and he wanted to turn it into a Cave Creek bus, complete with logos of the businesses he admired and thought did justice to Cave Creek. He asked for our logo and I sent it to him. To be honest, I thought it might look a little cheesy, having seen train wreck graphics on various cars around town.

But, this morning Sally, at the front desk, came back and said a gentleman was up front who wanted to show me the finished product—The True West bus. Well, it wasn't a gentleman, it was Mark, but when I took a gander at it, I flipped and went back into the office and made everyone come out and take a look.

Here's the True West Babes, Sheri, Shannon, Abby and Meghan, all ready for a True West road trip:

Yes, those are saddles on the roof and the theme on the sides is of a classic roadster pulling a trailer. It's quite a work of art and is a car within a car, if you will. You will be seeing us in this at the next 50 parades. Ha.

Meanwhile, on Saturday I attended memorial services for Mrs. Gertrude Sargent Mell. She was 97 and lived a great life. Ed Mell's son, Carson, told a wonderful story of visiting her and the talk turned to family gossip, which she didn't really like, so, after a couple comments, she said, "You know what they say, everyone is weird but you and me, and I'm not so sure about you."

From there, I attended the end of a writing seminar at Phoenix College featuring Ron Carlson, who read a short story of his in which he mentioned old school Country music as sounding like it was "recorded in someone's kitchen after everyone got through crying." Love that image.

Met Pattarapan and Thomas Charles at Gallo Blanco for lunch at Clarendon and Third Ave. Great Mexican food. Had the homemade guacamole and two pork tacos.

Worked the rest of the weekend on painting in my studio. Did another take on Not So Gentle Tamers, this one (the dress is poached from a painting by James McNeill Whistler) and the alternative title could be Rattlesnake Kate:

Kathy and I had dinner on Saturday night with Rose Mary and Larry Winget. Enjoyed a nice meal on the rooftop at Carefree Station. Larry mentioned he has programmed a CD of the songs he wants to be played at his funeral. He doesn't want to leave it to chance, or someone who would screw it up. Zany. This got me to thinking that even though I intend to be cremated, I thought about the idea of buying a gravestone at the Mountain View Cemetery in Kingman, between my mother and father (they are buried some 100 yards from each other, but were divorced a long time before that). I was noodling some zany ideas about what to write on the headstone commenting on that fact, when I read this quote:

"The cemetery isn't really a place to make a statement."
—Mary Elizabeth Baker

O Homo Rides Again!

November 18, 2011

Working on our Arizona Centennial issue. Big plans, lots of amazing, outrageous coverage. For example, back in 2002 we covered a character who showed up in Tombstone in the summer of 1891, without a gun, without a name and without clothes. He was arrested in nearby Charleston and the constable, Frank Broad, brought him to Tombstone. The bronzed visitor insisted on being called "O Homo." He claimed to have been arrested some 40 times prior to this, but, he added indignantly, Tombstone was the only place to put him behind bars. Camillus S. Fly paid him $5 for a sitting at his Fremont Street gallery (famous site of the Earp-Clanton gunfight). Fly took three photos and sold them nationwide for $1 a piece. A local newspaper, The Prospector,
offered him a column where he waxed philosophically on many subjects during his 30 day sentence. The articles became a nationwide sensation and O Homo received marriage proposals from many women. After his release, he showed up in Yuma, then from there he vanished. Or, did he?

In our 2002 coverage of O Homo in True West magazine we offered a $500 reward for anyone who could produce a Fly photo of O Homo. Obviously, Fly claimed to have sold quite a few prints, but even estimating conservatively, there must be a couple dozen of these novelties scattered in various attics, or storage sheds. Somewhere, someone has this picture and they probably think it's of a mountain climber or a circus performer. A San Francisco paper did a crude line drawing based on the photo and from that I created this sketch of what the print may look like:

The Mapinator, Gus Walker is in our offices today, working on a couple maps on Robert Ray's computer. Been a while since he has been here (he retired to Alabama several years ago). Great to see him. We're taking him out to lunch.

"An army of sheep led by a lion will defeat an army of lions led by a sheep."
—Old Vaquero Saying

ZZ Top Predicts: Tintin Tops Charts

November 17, 2011

It was in November of 1999 that three Mayflower trucks pulled up to the new True West offices behind Frontier Town in Cave Creek, AZ and demanded a cashier’s check for $12,920.40 before they’d unload all the back issues from Oklahoma. Bob McCubbin dubbed the premises “Clantonville” and a new era in the history of True West began.

Warning: serious name-dropping ahead
In the mid-eighties, Kathy and I were riding in a limo with ZZ Top's Billy Gibbons on our way to the Nogales Cafe smack dab in the middle of the Duece, in downtown Phoenix. Billy and crew headlined the sold-out Phoenix Coliseum the night before and now he is telling me a story of opening for the Stones and how Mick Jagger told him the trick in this media world is to put your antennae out to anticipate and pick up what is coming up ahead, then start creating as fast as you can to anticipate what it will be like when the audience catches up and, if you do, you will hit it big, as long as you stay true to your original vision. ZZ Top obviously did that with Eliminator and their ground breaking MTV videos, which foreshadowed the HBO series Hung by 20 inches, I mean years.

Kathy, Thomas Charles and myself were in Bolivia in 2009 at a finca (farm) high up in the mountains at a small village called Samaipata. The owner of the farm was an ex-pat Dutch dude and current hippy who was enamored of the comic strip Tintin. He had a stash of the hard cover books in our casita and although I couldn't read them (they were in Spanish), I enjoyed studying the clean lines of the cartoonist Herge. And, so along with the things we bought that day, I copied some of the panels:

It was just for grins, but I also wanted to study his silhouette techniques, and that is the Apache Kid running up the hill, above, a la Tintin.

I remember thinking at the time, I wonder why no one has tried to make a movie based on Tintin? Hint: the 24-book-series has sold 350 million copies and has been translated into 80 languages. Well, someone had already bought the rights and was prepping the movie even as I was doing these drawings in the mountains of Bolivia two years ago. He is from Phoenix and a couple of my friends were in his first 8mm movie, which he premiered at a downtown Phoenix theater. You may know him as Steven Spielberg.

So, as the Mickster taught Mr. Gibbons, that to get out front of the audience and by the time you come out, the audience will come. Well, I just read in the Hollywood Reporter that The Adventures of Tintin, starring Jamie Bell as Tintin, has opened in Europe and has already grossed $125 million. It will open here, I believe next month.

"The only thing new in this world, is the history you don't know."
—Harry Truman

Wyatt Earp, Age Appropriate

November 16, 2011

Dan Harshberger came out today and we worked hard on redesigning various departments. Lots of progress and good work was done.

Someone I know criticized my Wyatt Earp post yesterday as making him look too old. That Wyatt was 33 at the time of the fight and that my drawing made him "look like he is 50"). Well, part of the problem is that the Earps were blond and I think my rendering of his lighter mustaches tends to give him an older look.

Hmmmmm, I get the criticism because we all have a tendency to want to portray him as older, even in my time travel studies:

Anyway, is this young enough?

"You poo poo heads have been mean—I gonna smack you."
—Wyatt Earp, age 33 months

Wyatt Earp, Looking For A Fight?

November 15, 2011

Got caught in DMV hell this morning (Department of Motor Vehicles). Had to get my driver's license renewed. Actually, not as bad as in the past, but still, that department can suck the life force out of a death star.

Went home for lunch and whipped out a drawing of Wyatt Earp informing a certain group of cowboys that they have been looking for a fight and now they can have it:

This is a fight I have studied all my life, but I sometimes wonder if all our scholarship is flawed. And, I have to agree with Errol Morris:

"We falsely interpret the world around us. We ignore evidence that doesn't support our prior beliefs and we convince ourselves we know things we don't. We think we know things we don't know."
—Errol Morris, reviewing Stephen King's new book, 11•22•63

Not So Gentle Tamers, Part VI

November 14, 2011

Still working on my centennial piece "Not So Gentle Tamers." I'm leaning towards a more grandmotherly woman with the shovel and the dispatched rattlesnake, in honor of my own two grandmothers who inspired me with their grit.

And I may include a toddler in awe and shock at the decapitated snake AND the toughness of his grandmother, who, before this day was seen as the queen of the cookie jar, and not much more.

"It's a wise boy, who knows his grandmother"
—Old Vaquero Saying

The Conspirator

November 14, 2011

Nice day at home yesterday. Rained off and on all morning. Built a fire in the fireplace and watched "The Conspirator," the Robert Redford directed film about Mary Surratt, the first woman to be hanged. It all stemmed from the Lincoln assassination when the government, led by the Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, basically overreacted and rounded up hundreds of Rebel sympathizers, and held them without bail, then swiftly tried them before a military commission. One aspect of the historical record did not make it into the movie and that is the fact that on the gallows, one of the doomed men, Lewis Powell, shouted, "Mrs. Surratt is innocent and doesn't deserve to die with us." But she did. in spite of the drop, it took more than five minutes for the last of them to die.

Robin Wright (Penn) was quite good as were several others, including Tom Wilkinson and Kevin Kline. Really enjoyed the attention to detail on the costuming. Couple of great hats, which I'll rave about later.

I'm sorry I didn't support the flick when it came out last year. Watched Redford and crew on several TV shows trying desperately to drum up interest in the period piece, but of course, guys like me did not go out to the theater and I assume it died like Lincoln did. It's a shame. A very good movie and the company that made it was supposed to finance and produce other movies based on the history of America. We need to support these projects more and I promise to do better in the future.

"Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?"
—Old Infantile Saying

One More Run at Pearl Hart

November 11, 2011

Trying to finish five new True West Moments this afternoon. Got three in the can. Whipped out another image of Pearl Hart after lunch.

Love that date. Did a little research on the so-called Bandit Queen. She was certainly a slippery little gal.

In 1898, Pearl Hart was either a cook or a soiled dove (depending on who you believe) in Mammoth Arizona. When the mine closed (or, she got word her mother was sick in Ohio, depending, once again, on who you believe), Hart and her boyfriend, Joe Boot (probably an alias) robbed the Globe to Florence stagecoach getting some $431.20 but she returned one dollar to each passenger so they could get something to eat. A posse caught up with the hapless pair less than a week later and the two became snagged in the coils of the justice system. Escaping from lenient custody in Tucson, Pearl was recaptured and sent to the Yuma Territorial Prison. She was pardoned by the governor in 1902 and either left the state for good, or lived around Globe until 1955, depending on who you believe.

The rumor that she was pregnant when she was pardoned in a modern theory dating from the 1960s so I'm not sure I buy it. Either way, it's a great name and one half of a great story.

"Where's William Goldman when you really need him?"

—BBB (William Goldman wrote "Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid")

Wyatt Earp, Flagman!

November 11, 2011

One hundred and thirty one years ago tomorrow, Wyatt Earp signed on as a "Flagman" on a survey crew. Having been a rear chainman for several years myself in high school and college (mostly as a summer time job), the idea of Wyatt Earp hauling the chains and yelling out "Chain!" when the end of the 200-foot-measuring-metal-tape ripped by in the creosote bushes, is, well, kind of amazing and hilarious, to me.

A friend of mine, Patrick Neal, gifted me the original papers from the survey notes of the Mountain Maid Mine in Tombstone. The mine was filed on along with his brother Virgil and James. Here is the first page of the report:

And here's another page with Wyatt listed as "Flagman":

According to Bob McCubbin, this is Wyatt's handwriting (his signature) and here is the oath he took:

Now historians want to know how the legendary lawman, gambler and pimp could have sunk so low as to work as a surveyor. If you've ever worked on a crew, I think you understand it's just mind boggling.

"Wyatt Earp, Wyatt Earp, brave, courageous and cold. Long live his measurements and long live his chains, and long may his story be recorded at the courthouse."
—Future theme song for Wyatt Earp, Flagman!

11•11•11 Rattlesnake Dispatcher, Take 4

November 11, 2011

Today is one of those weird numerical days, with the calendar allegedly doing this only once every 685 years:

11•11•11

In honor of this uno-alignment I switched gears on my "Not So Gentle Tamer" concept and did a black and white (actually scratchboard) of an Arizona Pioneer Woman dispatching a Mohave Ring-tailed Rattlesnake with a shovel.

This is in honor of several here, who remembered their grandmothrs dispatched rattlesnakes with a shovel rather than a hoe. Makes some sense. And yes, that is Thumb Butte in the background, so this is a Prescott pioneer woman. Here's the proposed text:

Not So Gentle Tamers

Although some have portrayed early Arizona pioneer women as being "gentle tamers" the image does a bit of disservice to the toughness of these women. Whether they were wrangling ornery kids, or dispatching, hogs, chickens, scorpions and rattlesnakes, the women who were in Arizona Territory had to be tough. Sometimes they didn't have time for gentle and we, their offspring, admire and thank them for their grit.

Or, something like that. Anyway, wanted to honor the pioneer women who made Arizona what it is today. Of course, not everybody agrees with our accepted history:

"History is a pack of lies about events that never happened told by people who weren't there."—George Santayana

Pearl Hart

November 10, 2011

Working hard on our Arizona Centennial Special Issue in conjunction with our the redesign. Going to be sweet. Speaking of the centennial, here's our next Viva! Outlaw Women!

Yes, Pearl Hart was a handful. Robbed a stage with Joe Boot (what a great name!), sent to the hell hole. Got pregnant in the Yuma Pen, disappeared into nowhere, although Marshall Trimble claims she ended up in Globe, married to a semi-famous cowboy? Need to get to the bottom of that.

In Case, You Haven't Heard, The Rifleman Is Shooting Our Way Again

Plus, a slew of other Westerns. This is from the article on the reboot of the Rifleman:

The deal for The Rifleman was brokered by WME and Dan Black. This is the latest period Western put in development at the broadcast networks this season. Fox has a Wyatt Earp Western penned by John Hlavin, NBC has an untitled Kerry Ehrin project set in the 1880s, ABC has Ron Moore’s Hangtown , set in the early 1900 and David Zabel’s Gunslinger. Additionally, TNT recently gave a pilot order to Bruce C. McKenna and Danny Cannon’s Gateway, set in the 1880s, and the AMC series Hell On Wheels just premiered to strong ratings.

"Between flattery and admiration there often flows a river of contempt."
—Minna Antrim

The Legend of Chico Cano

November 9, 2011

Sometimes I get going on a character strictly because of the name. Case in point: down around the Texas Big Bend country there was a notorious Mexican bandit called Chico Cano. Found a photo of him with U.S. soldiers during a temporary truce (circa 1910). Whipped this out this morning:

He crossed the line with ease until he was double-crossed. Grab ahold of your pommel straps, this ride's going to get a little bumpy.

Or, he carried the load of the world on his shoulders. He felt at one with them. He recited a prayer and rode hard.

"The only human beings I have thorougly admired and respected in the world have been those who carried the load of the world with a smile, and who, in the face of anxieties that would have knocked me clean out, never showed a tremor."
—Henry Brooks Adams

Rock Holliday Rocks!

November 8, 2011

After my posting yesterday, we had a freak hail storm that dropped a couple inches of white stuff all over the desert. Went to lunch with Ken A. and when we got down to Carefree Highway two women at the stop light asked us to roll down our window. "Where are you coming from?" they asked, incredulous that Ken's truck was covered with ice. We told them Cave Creek and they couldn't believe it, since it was completely dry at the corner of Scottsdale Road and Carefree Highway (literally three miles from the storm).

Cool and wet out this morning, but crisp and clear. Kind of nice after nine months of summer.

Last weekend, a friend of the magazine, Gene "Rock" Holliday manned our True West booth down at the annual Empire Ranch festival. The legendary Empire Ranch is south of Sonoita, Arizona, and if I'm not mistaken, many Westerns were filmed there, like "Oklahoma" and "McClintock".

Gene came in yesterday to drop off the subscription money he collected and to tell me how much he enjoys being a True West Ambassador. In case you didn't know, Gene cuts a fine figure as a gunfighter:

When he got home, Gene sent me some other photos of him tricked out in different gear and this morning I was inspired by one of them to use for our upcoming Arizona Centennial issue, which will feature an O.K. Corral theme.

Whipped out this little study before I came into work this morning:

Working on a redesign, plus several other projects.

"Happiness is not a station you arrive at but a manner of traveling."
—Margaret Lee Runbeck

E.J. Montini and the mothers who make us cry

November 7, 2011

Woke up to a light drizzle. Really coming down now (12:12 p.m.) Our tenth annual Best of the West Source Book goes out the door this afternoon. Actually, it goes over the airways, into the cloud, landing at RR Donnelly near Kansas City some time later. Lots of tweaking this morning on the cover. Back and forth with Dan The Man Harshberger via email, phone and pdfs.

Yesterday, the Arizona Republic did a tribute to columnist E.J. Montini and the fact that he has been writing columns for the past 25 years. They ran a couple excerpts of his most beloved columns and this one, got to me (even though I read it the first time he printed it and knew what was coming):

"For a while after I started first grade, I'd rush outside every day when the bell rang for morning recess and stare up at [a staircase of 200 steps near the school]. About halfway down, sitting on a landing like the only person in an empty stadium, was my mother. It was part of a deal we'd made.

"I didn't like being in grade school, or being away from our neighborhood, or being away from her, so my mother came up with a plan.


"Each morning, only a few hours after I'd left for school. she'd stop whatever she was doing and walk from our house to the steps. She promised to be there, about halfway down, when I got out for recess.


"'I'll see you and you'll see me and we'll both feel better,' she said.

"I'd shove my way onto the playground at the first chime of the recess bell, and look up. And there she'd be.


"At first, I spent most the play period waving at her and watching her wave back. After a week or two, I'd wave only few times before running off with friends, checking every once in a while to make sure she was still there. She always was.


"Then, one day, I didn't look up.


"I have no memory of that day. She couldn't forget it. It's what kids do, she said. They grow up. They move from one phase to the next. They make you happy and sad at the same time.


"I didn't understand it before I had children of my own. Now, I do."

—E.J. Montini

That damn mother made me cry. Full disclosure: I'm 64 and riddled with estrogen. And, by mother, I mean Ed Montini, the bastard!

"It is a wise man who knows where courage ends and stupidity begins."
—Jerome Cady

Saturday Night Dinner at Cartwright's

November 6, 2011

Cave Creek held its annual Wild West Weekend. We had a big rainstorm blow in on Friday night and it was still quite wet and cold on Saturday morning, but the parade came off anyway. I rode in a wagon as grand marshal and I would say I knew most of the people along the sidelines. Ha. But they were hardy.

On Saturday evening it was a different story. A packed house at Cartwright's next door to the True West World Headquarters. Here is Eric Flatt's blog on the event complete with photos:

Wild West Night at Cartwright's

Arizona Politics At The O.K. Corral

November 4, 2011

Had our first go with a live audience last night at the Kerr Cultural Center in Scottsdale. Jana Bommersbach, Marshall Trimble and I did about six minutes, as an opening act for Marshall's show, to try out a couple Arizona Centennial bits and see how they play. Ken Amorosano taped it for critiquing purposes. One issue we're dealing with right off the bat is that all three of us are veterans of taking over a room and it is going to take a bit of polishing to get the herky-jerkyness out of our presentation. Each of us is used to self starting and then building on story after story, so, handing off after one story has a sort of stop-go quality that we need to iron out. But we'll get there. Great working with two pros.

On a related note, the three of us are also working on the cover package for the February issue of True West, our Special Arizona Centennial Issue. The same material needs to be customized for our True West magazine audience. One of the great quotes from Jana (see below) is our starting point for the cover.

Our Art Director, Dan Harshberger, wants to build on the cubist O.K. Corral image I did recently:

I did a background patina piece for it:

Now to do a stylized version of the gunfight at the bottom and leave the rest for logo and headlines. Could be very sweet.

"All politics in Arizona starts with the O.K. Corral."
—Jana Bommersbach

Fred Nolan, One Funny Bastard

November 3, 2011

My neighbors are at the Grand Canyon and, before they left, they dutifully put out their recycling bin and their garbage bin, side by side, for pickup today. Unfortunately, scavengers—most likely javelinas or commission-only-real-estate agents—tipped over the garbage can and spread a ton of garbage over a very wide area. So, like a good neighbor, I was there and went over before I came into work and picked up the whole dang deal.

So Fred Nolan sniped at my title for this study ("Sheepherder and His Faithful Dog") asking if it took me very long to come up with that title. So I asked him to come up with something better and he replied, without hesitation, "Down Boy".

Dang, that is funny. He's such a card. Makes me ashamed I didn't think of it.

Marshall Trimble, Jana Bommersbach and myself are going to do a dress rehearsal for our True Arizona round robin presentation tonight at the Kerr Cultural Center. This is the test run for our upcoming TV show about Arizona's centennial. Going to be fun. Ken is taping it so we can critique it.

Juni Fisher is in town and we're jamming on a new cowgirl character. Got some good stuff going. Sketches and snippets to follow.

"The weakest of all weak things is a virtue which has not been tested in the fire."
—Mark Twain

One Tough Cookie vs. Hoe Down

November 2, 2011

Finally chilly out (low sixties). Had to laugh at the quote from the guy at the National Weather Service back on September 1: "People keep asking me when it is going to cool off, and the flippin' answer is Halloween."

True that.

Worked this morning on a tighter study for my Arizona Centennial painting subject: "Not So Gentle Tamers." Did this one this morning.

Note the rattlesnake head at the bottom. Will do a tighter version on the final. Like this more severe Victorian dress and attitude. Alternate titles: "One Tough Cookie" and "Hoe Down."

Having spent several days in Tombstone, Doc Holliday has been on my mind lately and this quote applies doubly to him:

"The man who has ceased to fear has ceased to care."
—Francis Herbert Bradley

The Faithful Sheepherder

November 1, 2011

A very large coyote got my last remaining rooster and a chick last Friday. Just as I was coming out to feed, I spotted the big predator standing over the decapitated rooster. He gave me a look, then sauntered to the corner and jumped our five foot chain-linked fence in one bound. I found the lone remaining hen, cowering by a pile of wood in the corner and put her back in the coop. Needless to say she was a nervous wreck. No sign of the chick. The coyote must have popped her in his mouth like a bon bon.

Over the weekend, the Arizona Republic did a feature on one of the last sheepherders on the Navajo res. He is in his nineties (I think it said he was 97) and he still tends to his sheep in the old way. With the predators on my mind, I whipped out this little study this morning before I came into work:

I call it "The Faithful Sheepherder And His Faithful Dog." This scene was modeled for me in the late 1990s by Flint Carney and my Australian Shepherd Peaches. I found the photo about a month ago and have it on one of my art desks. Saw it this morning and took a quick stab at it, completing it in about a half hour. I have thought about this image for a long time, but I like some of the vagueness of it. Didn't have much expectation for it, AND I expected it to fail because it was merely a study. Gee, I wonder what ol' Hoffer has to say about this?

"There can be no real freedom without the freedom to fail."
—Eric Hoffer