Dressing for Semi-Success And New Mexico Here I Come!

 April 1, 2025

   It's been a while, but we're headed for New Mexico next week to go visit this tiny berg.

   Don't tell anyone, but here's a sneak peek at the next cover.

   I tell you, that Dan the Man is a talented mahoo. Totally rocks.

   Had an online staff meeting this morning, so I half-dressed up, which means I kept my morning togs on, below the screen. When Kathy came home from Jazzercize, I went out to the garage to meet her and she caught me dressed, well, like this.

Dressing for Semi-Success

Top half professional, bottom half recreational.

(Yes, Uno finds it hilarious.)

"The truth is simple. If it was complicated, everyone would understand it."

—Walt Whitman

Typical Artist Dodging The Truth But Finishing 10,000 Bad Drawings Like A Pro

 March 31, 2025

   Been looking back at my original quest of doing 10,000 bad drawings. Hard to believe now, but I achieved that dubious goal way back in August of 2009.

Daily Whip Outs: "August 7, 2009

Daily Whip Outs: "August 3, 2009

Daily Whip Outs:

"Buck-toothed Studies, August 10, 2009

Daily Whip Outs:

"Final Exam, August 30, 2009"

(What if Frederic Remington met R. Crumb at Woodstock?)

Daily Whip Out: "Bonus Sketch: A Hat"

   So, I am 15 years on and still reaching for the big brass Whip Out ring.

Meanwhile, this just in from my neighbor:

   My email has been hacked again. This is the third time I've had to rename my dog.

"One wonders how some [artists] ever came to painting at all after exhibiting such surprising ability to dodge knowledge."
—Robert Henri

Marshall Trimble and I Score Navajo Hatbands

 March 30, 2025

   Drove out to Apache Junction yesterday morning for a big show at the Superstition Mountain Lost Dutchman Museum. I personally brought Marshall Trimble out of retirement so he could sign our co-written book, "The 66 Kids." Here we are at our table before we bought new hatbands.

Marsh and BBB sans new hatbands

   And then, just like that, we had Navajo hatbands because our table neighbor, Alyce B. Tso, suggested we try on her handmade Navajo hatbands.

Marsh, Alyce and BBB with new hatbands

      Alyce B. Tso (pronounced Alice B. So, as in Alice Be So Navajo) is from Cameron, Arizona up on the Navajo Res and we hit it off immediately. Nobody is funnier to me than the Navajo when it comes to Zane, with the possible exception of the Hualapais.

"I don't like snow because it's white and it's on my land."

—Old Hualapai Saying

From Billy to Buckeye, From Dust to Dusting

 March 28, 2025

   Just got word that Buckeye Blake's long awaited Billy In Death shrine sculpture is at the foundry and Buckeye hisself drove 13 hours home after delivering it.

Buckeye's Billy Shrine

   We—Buckeye, Kid Ross and myself—are going to have an art show at the Lamy Church, south of Santa Fe, and I am contributing a version of the Kid's last second on earth.

Daily Whip Out: "Old Vaquero In Hell 2.0"

      Meanwhile, in Old Fort Sumner on a hot July night. . .

Daily Whip Out: "Quien es, Pete?"

   I think his question was more furtive than menacing. But that's just an old man talking.

   And, here are the seeds to a song I'd like to hear, with a growling guitar line:

Quien es? Quien es, Pete? Who's in your bedroom suite?

Yo quiero tu hermana,  beyond manana. . quien es, bro, 

¿Puedo casarme con ella? (Can I marry her?)

Can I take her hand in marriage? Too late, cabrone, too late. . .Quien es, Pete?

Something like that.

Daily Whip Out: "Olive's Regret"

Heading into the Beast this morning to pick up the first batch of BozeCards. These suckers are going to be free to any of you who read this blog.

First BozeCard Hot Off The Press!

Let me know if you want one delivered to your house by the U.S. Post Office. Send me your mailing address to bozebell@twmag.com

From Dust to Dusting

"You come from dust and you will return to dust. That's why I don't dust. It could be someone I know."

—Old Housewife Saying

Billy Is Back & Hellraisers & Trailblazers Honoring Jana Bommersbach

 March 26, 2025

   Got this going for me. Woke up thinking about a title of a painting.

Daily Whip Out: "Billy Is Back!"

   And, really, was he ever really away? Not in my world.

Daily Whip Out:

"Smiling Billy at Midnite in Lincoln

On The Most Dangerous Street In America."

   I also need to come up with some worthy Mexican mourners for Buckeye's Billy Wake Shrine. Got some good reference. Need to make some serious hay today.

Daily Whip Out: "Old Fort Sumner Mourners"

   Had a history talk down at the Holland Center last night at six. We found two boxes of Hellraisers otherwise it's all sold out. Made me think of Jana, my co-author. We had some fun.

“That is the theme of my life. I can’t stand injustice. So women who are messed over because they’re women, and who are maligned and whose lives are stolen from them because they’re at the mercy of vicious forces, that really attracts me."

—Jana Bommersbach

Marshall Is Coming Out of Retirement, Cousins Galore and A Recipe for Disaster

 March 24, 2025

     As you may know, Marshall Trimble has retired, but I talked him into coming out of the lap of luxury for one more trip down memory lane, this Saturday at the Superstition Mountain Lost Dutchman Museum from 10 to 3 on Saturday. See you there, but be sure to wear hipboots. It's going to get deep, real fast.

Small Town BSers Unite for One More Run

https://superstitionmountainlostdutchmanmuseum.org/

Cousins Galore

   When we were at Old Tucson for the Jay Dusard True Westerner Award presentation, my Kingman cousin, Robert Jerl Stockbridge showed up. Haven't seen him in some time and, just for the record he looks just like his old man.

Robert Allen and Robert Jerl

(yes, we are both named for our grandfather, Robert Guess)

   Meanwhile, today my cousin from my dad's side of the family came out to Cave Creek so we could catch up on the Bell side of the family.

Cousin Mike Richards of Des Moines, Iowa

A Recipe for Disaster

   On January 1, 1856 Brigham Young appointed John D. Lee “Farmer to the Indians”. In this capacity Lee was a federal government agent and it was his job to protect the Southern Paiutes and emigrants from each other and to teach them to farm. Lee was paid a $600 annual salary, paid in gold, which was a fortune in that time and place. There were also rumors that the Mormons were arming their Paiute allies. Lt. Sylvester Mowry of the U.S. Army claimed they were “all armed with good rifles. Two years ago they were armed with nothing but bows and arrows of the poorest description.”

   Author Will Bagley makes the claim “The Mormons came to regard the Indians as a weapon God had placed in their hands.” And that the Indians would help to fulfill Joseph Smith’s Laminate prophesies, and “avenge the blood of the prophets.” Patriarch Elisha H. Groves prophesied as he blessed Col. William Dame in 1854, “The angel of vengeance shall be with thee.” Many of the Southern Utah Saints believed the war at the end of time had already begun and the Saints believed the Indians were a weapon God had placed in their hands.

   As the conflict between the U.S. government and Mormons increased, so did harassment of travelers. Into this cauldron of resentment the Fancher wagon train proceeded tragically. Add to that, the belief in blood atonement and you have a recipe for the slaughter that followed.

   The Southern Utah Saints saw themselves as Old Testament people As one of them, Jedediah Grant, put it, “We would not kill a man, of course, unless we killed him to save him.”

   Add to all of this, the Mormon apostle Parley Platt’s brutal assassination in Arkansas at the hands of a vengeful husband which did nothing to endear the Saints towards wagon trains from Arkansas traveling through their region.

"The hardest thing to learn in life is which bridge to cross and which to burn."

—Bertrand Russell

One Little Kiss And Felina Is Gone

 March 23, 2025

  So, I am reading "The Mexican Corrido: A Feminist Analysis," and the writer, Maria Herrera-Sobek does a whole chapter on The Traitor Eve, and how, as in the Garden of Eden where Eve betrays Adam with a poisoned apple, in the Mexican Corridos, La Traidora (The Female Traitor!), harkens back to Dona Marina, La Malinche, or La Lengua (The Tongue!), who acted as an interpreter for Cortez and sold out her Aztec countrymen by advising Cortez on how to get to their weak spots. The author Maria points out, via a popular corrido from the 1920s there are four steps in "the path of the circle" and that is Death-Adventure-Betrayal-Death. and I thought that was kind of confusing, but familiar, and then I remembered a song by Marty Robbins, that hits this cycle perfectly and was a huge hit when I was a kid:

Marty Robbins meets Felina. Yeah, right.

Out in the West Texas town of El Paso
I fell in love with a Mexican girl
Nighttime would find me in Rosa's cantina
Music would play and Felina would whirl

Blacker than night were the eyes of Felina
Wicked and evil while casting a spell
My love was deep for this Mexican maiden
I was in love but in vain, I could tell

One night a wild young cowboy came in
Wild as the West Texas wind
Dashing and daring, a drink he was sharing
With wicked Felina, the girl that I loved

So in anger I challenged his right for the love of this maiden
Down went his hand for the gun that he wore
My challenge was answered in less than a heartbeat
The handsome young stranger lay dead on the floor

Out through the back door of Rosa's I ran
Out where the horses were tied
I caught a good one, it looked like it could run
Up on its back and away I did ride

Just as fast as I could
From the West Texas town of El Paso
Out to the badlands of New Mexico

Back in El Paso my life would be worthless
Everything's gone in life, nothing is left
It's been so long since I've seen the young maiden
My love is stronger than my fear of death

I saddled up and away I did go
Riding alone in the dark
Maybe tomorrow a bullet may find me
Tonight nothing's worse than this pain in my heart

And at last, here I am on the hill, overlooking El Paso
I can see Rosa's cantina below
My love is strong and it pushes me onward
Down off the hill to Felina I go

Off to my right I see five mounted cowboys
Off to my left ride a dozen or more
Shouting and shooting, I can't let them catch me
I have to make it to Rosa's back door

Something is dreadfully wrong, for I feel
A deep burning pain in my side
Though I am trying to stay in the saddle
I'm getting weary, unable to ride

But my love for Felina is strong and I rise where I've fallen
Though I am weary, I can't stop to rest
I see the white puff of smoke from the rifle
I feel the bullet go deep in my chest

From out of nowhere Felina has found me
Kissing my cheek as she kneels by my side
Cradled by two loving arms that I'll die for

One little kiss and Felina, goodbye. . . 

—Marty Robbins, El Paso

Daily Whip Out: "La Lengua!"

Ozona Cowboys From Dust to Dust

 March 22, 2024

   The less you see the more you understand. This is just one of the insights I have gleaned from an extra 17 years on the planet. Yes, it was on this date, March 22nd, that I had my own personal "Wipeout" at a band reunion in Kingman. And, every extra year I get, I stop to give thanks for the overtime. And, also to take stock of what I might have learned.

Daily Whip Out:

"Ozona Cowboy 4:44"

   For everything I gained, I lost something. And, for everything I lost, I gained something. And, yes, I am stuck with you here in this dopamine desert.

Daily Whip Out:

"Ozona Cowboy 5:55"

Daily Whip Out:

"Ahead of The Dust Storm Barely"

   Too maudlin? Sorry, can't help you there. I measure my remaining time by the moments.

"It's getting dark, too dark to see. . ."

—Bob Dylan, "Knockin' On Heaven's Door"

John D. Lee Hurled Into Eternity While Sitting On His Coffin

 March 21, 2025

   Interesting that the capital punishment industry is considering a return to the bullet in the heart method as a "more humane" alternative to lethal injection and hanging. The more things change. . . 

   And speaking of firing squads, it's hard to top the absurd reality of John D. Lee's sendoff at the scene of his crime.

Daily Whip Out:

"John D. Lee Falls Into Eternal Rest"

(from an engraving published at the time)

   U.S. Army sharpshooters stood in the enclosure of three wagons parked in a U-shaped semi-circle. Tarps were wrapped around the wagons and the exposed corners to help conceal the shooter's identities. Sitting on his coffin, Lee had a hood placed over his head and he raised his arms high and said, "Center my heart, boys." After the command of "Ready. Aim. Fire!" the shooters did just that and Lee fell backwards into his coffin.

Back to Mountain Meadows

   After the second trial and several appeals on behalf of Mr. Lee, the U.S. government finally got a guilty verdict and it was decreed that the alleged ringleader of the Mountain Meadows disaster should be driven to that exact meadow and shot to death by a firing squad. It was supposed to be a secret, but one of the attorneys alerted the press and you know how that goes: everyone has one person they can trust, so the next day as the U.S. troops and their prisoner arrived at the execution site, so did 75, or so, gawkers.

The Gawkers

   Note the wagon tongue at right which is part of one of the wagons used to conceal the shooters.

One Final Irony

   It's the old gypsy curse: may you be found among lawyers!

John D. Lee, seated at right, with his legal team, including Wells Spicer over Lee's left shoulder. Spicer of course would find himself at another legal circus, I mean hearing, in Tombstone, A.T. in November of 1881 presiding over the Fremont Street Fight, later to be made famous as the Gunfight at The O.K. Corral.

Coffin Lounger

   A photograph of John D. Lee moments before his execution looking at the camera. After the exposure was taken Lee reportedly called the photographer over and asked him to be sure and send a couple prints to his "two favorite wives." Of all his many wives, only Caroline, Emma and Rachel stayed with him to the end, so it's interesting that out of the trio, he still had two favorites.

John D. Lee's final repose

   Bitter to the end

"I was guided in all that I did which is called criminal, by the orders of the leaders in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints."

—John D. Lee

Just Desserts And Scapegoat Shenanigans

 March 20, 2025

   We're wrapping up the tangled web of historic intrigue that still surrounds and haunts the Mountain Meadows affair. Even with the massive amounts of recent scholarship, it's still very difficult to close the circle, or to put it another way, to get closure on the circle. It's like all our efforts to capture and tame the truth are stored in a broken jar.

Daily Whip Out: "The Scapegoat"

A Timeline of The John D. Lee Saga

• The tragic culmination of threats and religious hatred combined with a crazy plan, doomed an entire wagon train at Mountain Meadows, September 11, 1857

• Col. James Carleton's savage report unveils the true perpetrators at Mountain Meadows but war clouds delay any move towards justice.

• The Civil War intervenes 1861-1864

• New government efforts by the Justice Department reopen the case. In 1874 indictments are issued against eight alleged Mountain Meadows participants with a $500 reward on each. They include, John D. Lee, Issac Haight, William Dame, John Higbee, among others.  

• John D. Lee is arrested in Panguitch, Utah, November 4, 1876

• John D. Lee's first trial

• John D. Lee's second trial

• John D. Lee is executed at Mountain Meadows

• Some of the remaining co-conspirators scatter to the wind while one came out of the troubles somewhat unscathed.

Dueling Confessions

   One of the problems with understanding exactly what happened at Mountain Meadows is all the conflicting confessions. Klingonsmith gave a confession—and John D. Lee gave several at different times. In addition to those, one of Lee's wives, Emma Lee, claimed that three men came to Lonely Dell (Lee's Ferry) looking for Lee's 1857 diary. According to Emma the diary contained "the three orders from Dame and Haight to go and take part in the massacre." Emma also claimed the men destroyed the diary. Damning testimony against Dame and Haight, if it's true. Unfortunately, as Will Bagley put it, "All of Lee's confessions were a tangled mix of truth and fiction."

Daily Whip Out: "John D. Lee In Red"

Guilty As Sin

   A short list of what happened to the remaining Mountain Meadows co-conspirators who were known derisively as "The Mountain Meadows Dogs." This notorious pack included Lee, Haight, Higbee and Stewart, among others.

Daily Whip Out: "Issac Haight"

    Issac Haight, fled Utah under the alias of "Horton" and wandered between the LDS settlements in Arizona, Colorado and Mexico and died as a member in good standing in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Thatcher, Arizona in 1904.

Daily Whip Out: "Philip Klingonsmith"

  Philip Klingonsmith was kicked in the head by a horse and soon after lost his position as leader of the LDS church in Cedar City. After fleeing to Nevada he confessed his involvement at Mountain Meadows and named names. Afterwards he was forever fearful of being assassinated. Rumor says he died in either Nevada or Mexico.

Daily Whip Out:

"Colonel William H. Dame"

The One Dude Who Basically Skated

Col. William H. Dame was the mayor of Parowan, Utah and he controlled the military in Iron County. He was also a stake president of the LDS church in Parowan. Although he was arrested and spent time in jail for his role, Dame was subsequently acquitted of his charges—the prosecutor dropped charges against Dame as part of a deal to convict Lee—and Dame went on to hold other offices. At the end of his life Dame refused to clear Brigham Young and died of paralysis, actually a second stroke, in 1884. He was 64.

Daily Whip Out: "Jacob Hamblin"

   Jacob Hamblin was in Salt Lake City meeting with Brigham Young at the time of the massacre, and Young allegedly instructed Hamblin about the Paiutes, that they "must learn to help us, or the United States will kill us both." Hamblin was away when the massacred happened but he met John D. Lee on the trail and Lee admitted his roles in the killings. After the massacre, the surviving children were initially taken to Hambin's ranch, and three of them resided there for the next two years. A year after the massacre Hamblin went on a mission to the Hopi in Arizona where he took a Hopi wife (he eventually had four wives and would father 24 children). Hamblin also advised John Wesley Powell's second expedition into the Grand Canyon. Following the Edmunds Act of 1882, an arrest warrant was issued for Hamblin for practicing polygamy. From then on he continually moved to avoid arrest, moving from Arizona to New Mexico and then Chihuahua, Mexico where he died on August 31, 1886.

Daily Whip Out: "John B. Higbee"

   The field commander at Mountain Meadows John Higbee saw his career blossom after the massacre and he was elected mayor of Cedar City from 1867 to 1871. Brigham Young appointed Higbee president of the town's United Order in 1874. After Lee's arrest in 1874, Higbee went into hiding. Using the alias "Bull Valley Snort," Higbee wrote a  document for his family, giving his version of the massacre in February 1894. At the end of his self-serving excuses—his basic claim is "the Indians made us do it."—Higbee said the massacre had left him "damned, his family scattered, some dead, others grown up and strangers to him." He died in Cedar City in December of 1904.

"It seems Somebody has contracted a Great debt."

—Bull Valley Snort

Amber And The Pursuit of Dust to Dust

 March 19, 2025

   As you may know I carry a sketchbook with me everywhere I go and often sketch random things I see, or build on ideas I would like to see.

Saint-Remy-de-Provence, France, 2015

   So, I had my sketchbook with me this past weekend at the Tucson Festival of Books. On Saturday afternoon a young girl came up to our booth, spied my sketchbook sitting on a chair behind me, and asked if she could look at it. I didn't think anything about it and handed it to her. Most people who look through my sketchbooks, do so with mild interest and promptly hand it back, but Amber looked at every page intensely, reading my notes, even turning back several pages to reread a section, apparently trying to catch a flow. I started to get slightly nervous about it because I often put raw notes in there. Stuff like, "I wish I could draw better!" and, "Well, there goes my career!" Anyway, after about ten minutes I said, just to be polite, "So, do you want to be an artist?" To which Amber smiled and said, "I already am."

Amber is an Artist

   I loved her immediately.

   Meanwhile, in my current sketchbook, the one Amber perused last Saturday, I am hell bent on discovering all the subtle shades of dust. Here is a sketch from this morning.

Daily Whip Out: "Visibility Almost Zero"

   In a typical Kingman dust storm—that I grew up in—you can't see anything, but at the moment it starts to pass, vague shapes come into view. That is the moment I am trying to capture.

Daily Whip Out: "Incoming Dusty Chaps"

Daily Whip Out: "From Dust to Dust"

   Come to think of it that would be a cool title for for an art show.

"Everything is dust in the wind. . ."

—Kansas

Losing Our Shirts And Grinning Like Jackasses

 March 18, 2025

   So the burning question is, how do we keep up with Steamy Lit, the little juggernaut book cooperative that grossed $92 million last year? Some of our guys were wondering just this in our booth last weekend at the Tucson Festival of Books and one of them asked aloud how we could ever compete with the Steamy crowd when it comes to our heroes, like Jesse, Billy and Wyatt. One female in our tent had a zinger answer:

"Take their shirts off!"

—Micki Fuhrman

   Hmmmm, so, what would that look like?

Wild Bill Steamy BozeCard

   Yes, I had Dan The Man afix Jack Reacher's body to Wild Bill's head. Ain't that a beastly match? And speaking of Beastly, what kind of articles would we need to run to appeal to the steamy crowd? Here's a couple starter ideas aping the covers I saw on the Steamy Lit website:

A Virgin for The Beastly Doc!

The Dark Surrender of Paulita Maxwell!

I groaned Jesse's Name As I Shattered!

Butch Went Off Inside Me Like A Gunshot!

I Was Taken By A Mountain Man!

(no, wait! That's a real title!)

"Is that a pistol in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?"

—Mae West

   Okay, what you got?