Where Is Sheri? Robert M. Utley Scores And A Legendary Dishwasher

December 11, 2019
   Here is a little guessing game I'd like to play with you.

Where Is Sheri?

   Our True West Roving Ambassador, Sheri Jensen, at left, is at a famous gunfighter's grave. That's Bernie Sargent, at right, of Six Guns & Shady Ladies re-enactors. The cemetery is tucked under the I-10 Freeway near the border (hint: not Canada). Whose grave are they standing in front of?

Fun fact: Billy the Kid washed dishes at the Hotel de Luna near Bonita, Arizona as a lad.

"Billy In Bonita"

   So, if you want to figure out who might be a legend from our time, you might start by checking out the kitchen of your fave restaurant. 

   We just filmed an interview with this legendary dude:

Bob and Bob

   I had the honor and privilege of interviewing the 90-year-old historian, Robert M. Utley, above, about his interview with the 97-year-old Charlie Windolph, who, in 1947, was the last survivor of the troopers who fought at the Battle of The Little Bighorn in 1876. That is one long stretch—143 years!—between Mr. Utley talking to Mr. Windolph and me talking to Bob. Amazing.

   Two degrees of Custer & Crazy Horse!

   The interview will be featured on our website and the article about the Utley interview will be featured in the next issue (February-March) of True West magazine.

"What has 15 actors, four settings, two writers and one plot line?"

"The last 632 Hallmark Christmas movies."
—Old Hollywood Saying

The True West Travel Crew

December 10, 2019
    Went over to Z's for lunch today to talk about True West feature historical travel assignments for 2020.

 L to R: Publisher Ken Amorosano, BBB,

Editor Stuart Rosebrook,

Regional Sales Rep Sheri Jensen

   Lots of great ideas on how to get better coverage for history sites around the West. Sheri, above, travels in an RV with her husband Randy, and she personally drives through all her territories and meets directly with her clients and spends time in their area seeking out the best places for our readers to visit and experience. Stuart suggested we start a feature on "Where's Sheri," with her posed in front of iconic Western locations. So, Sheri is now on assignment and expect to see her pretty face down the road, a piece.

   And speaking of oldtimer history:

Marshall Trimble in 1942 ready

to go to war in his daddy's boots

  Final Tweak On A Daily Whip Out:

"Red Lake Rider #4"

   And, here's a new one.

Daily Whip Out: "The Deluge"

   Working on a cover idea:

Daily Whip Out: "Back Into The Fray"

   Here's Samantha Crowley doing an impromptu photo shoot to feature our archives finally being online. This was shot in our conference room.

"Men fight for liberty and win it with hard knocks. Their children, brought up easy, let it slip away again, poor fools. And their grand-children are once more slaves."

—D. H. Lawrence

Fernando Blasted Up The Trail And Geronimo Art Show Poster

December 9, 2019 
   The rain lifted this morning.

   Then another storm blew in from the east and drenched us in the afternoon.

"A Gully Washer"

   Took some time to tweak a couple "finished" paintings, including this one:

"Fernando Blasted Up The Trail

On A Borrowed Horse"

   Meanwhile, Rebecca Edwards designed a postcard invitation-Art Poster this afternoon for a certain upcoming party and it's pretty damn groovy:

"When you can start thinking in images, without words, you're well on the way."
—William S. Burroughs

An Unlikely Tale Well Told

December 8, 2019
   Nice rainy day at home. Reworked a couple border scenes, like this one:

"Red Lake Rider"

  We drove in the rain, for an hour, down to Tempe last night to see the live version of the John Leguizamo show, "Latin History for Morons."

   Even though we paid $300 for tickets, apparently I am one of the morons. I was reminded of the old adage that if someone riled up is in for a long talk, you're in for a long listen.

"Those Rurales Came Out of A Side Canyon

On The Jump"

   Here's the deal: I have a problem with identity politics and revenge narratives, both of which Mr. Leguizamo leans on—heavily—in his humorous but strident, taken on revisionist Latin history. I was ready to laugh at our foibles, but it was more hectoring than standup, occasionally hilarious, but mostly bitter comeuppance. That gets old real fast. Towards the end of the two-hour show he asked a rhetorical question and in the pause, a woman behind us yelled out "Treason!" and two others yelled out "Bullshit!" I took that to mean not everyone in Grady Gammage was buying his repackaging of American history.

"Sometimes A Gully Washer

Has Your Name On It"

   Still, I'm glad I went and I admire his passion, just not some of his wounded assertions. The biggest falsehood, to me, which Leguizamo adamantly claims, is the notion that everyone was happy in the Americas before the arrival of Columbus. Now to me, that is moronic. Good luck telling that to the Comanches and the Apaches.

"The Border Crossers"

  So I have been trying to read "News of The World" by Paulette Jiles for some time now and I've had a tough time getting past the premise: "These small towns in North Texas were always hungry for news and a presenter to read it. It was so much more entertaining than sitting at home read the papers, having only yourself, or your spouse to whom you could make noises of outrage or astonishment. Then, of course, there were those who could not read at all, or only haltingly."

   This strikes me as totally absurd as a premise for a book, but Tom Hanks is set to star as the news reader in a movie that is filming even as you read this. I have never read or come across any historical evidence about the need for this service out on the American frontier—the story takes place after the Civil War—or more absurdly, that people would pay money to hear some guy read "the news of the world" in a frontier town. However, if we are talking about a metaphor about the evening news, or CNN or Fox, well, perhaps If I look at this way, it has some currency.

   Anyway, I was trudging along, trying to get interested and then I came to this little set piece, where our hero, Captain Kidd (groan) is taking a 10-year-old girl back to her relatives after she has been living with Kiowa In-dins, who killed her parents, etc. While the Captain is reading to a rapt audience, the guy who he paid to watch the Kiowa captive, comes in to report her missing. They run, in the rain, following her bare feet to the Red River where the girl is standing at the river's edge yelling at a group of Kiowa on the other side and imploring them to come save her. They can't hear her, or perhaps don't believe her (she's dressed like a white girl) and then we get this:

"One of the warriors on the far side unsheathed a long weapon and lifted it. A lengthy barrel shone blue-white in a lightning flash. He aimed and fired. A muzzle flash as long as a chimney brush and then the heavy bullet struck the stone near them and sent piece of red sandstone flying."

   The girl does not move but calls out again for them to save her. So the Sharps wielding Kiowa fires again: "Another giant five-hundred-and-twenty-grain bullet tore through the air overhead. Even above the noise of the rain they heard the nyow-ow-ow sound and it hit a bur oak and tore off a limb big as a drainpipe."

   Big as a drainpipe. Not a "thick limb" or a big ol' chunk of wood" but a branch as "big as a drainpipe."

   As I mentioned, this is an unlikely tale, well told. So, now I'm all in. It's kind of a cross between "True Grit" and "Empire of The Summer Moon." Not a bad hybrid.

   I'm now looking forward to the movie.

"One useless man is a shame, two is a law firm, and three is a congress."

—John Adams

El Viejo Pendejo In The Campfire Light

December 7, 2019
   Still studying campfire light for a short story idea I have:

     Driving out to Tempe this evening to see this one man show:

   More viejo pendejo:

"El Viejo Pendejo In The Campfire Light"

   As he tells his story we flash back to here:

"The Pendejo Rides In"

   And then, to here:

   More tales from on the border with Boze. Meanwhile, I am listening to my new favorite song:

"Over and over we try and we fail, to figure out this game we're all in. . .May not have gotten all that I dreamed of. . .pretty sure I got what I deserved."
—Slaid Cleves, "Already Gone" on the CD "Ghost On The Car Radio"

A Texas Ranger Meets The Cover Boys

December 6, 2019
   This image of a Texas Ranger has always intrigued me, especially the placement of his knife worn next to the reversed pistol.

A Texas Ranger Frontier Battalion 

   I know. I know. Some of you believe he slid it around because the photographer told him to do it, but I don't buy it. I've seen too many Ranger photos with this arrangement to think otherwise.

   Meanwhile, here are three other guys who agree with me:

The Cover Boys

L to R: Dan The Man Harshberger, Robert Ray, Stuart Rosebrook and BBB at Los Dos Molinos on Camelback Road in Phoenix, going over future covers for True West magazine.

Got up to (yawn) another stunning sunrise this morning.

Another yawner over Ratcliff Ridge

   Lots of talk around here about "The Irishman." I almost gave up on it after the first hour (it's three-and-a-half hours long!), but, ultimately, I was glad I stayed with it. I agree with these wise guys:

"Joe Pesci is a revelation. He's lost the strut and the shtick that use to define his performances, and does everything with his sad, watchful eyes and his lovely, walnut-shell face. When he and Robert De Niro are onscreen together, you believe in the power of art."

—The New York Times

Vaquero Busts Loose, Geronimo's Smirk And A Line In The Sand

December 5, 2019
   Went home for lunch and finished a vaquero piece I have been noodling for a week or so.

"Vaquero Busts Loose"

  My Uncle Glenn Marvin (my father's little brother) asked me to do a "quick sketch" of he and his pretty wife, Claudia, for their Christmas card. I really didn't want to do it, but, well, I knew what my dad would want, so against my better judgement I gave it a go.

"Two of My Favorite Norwegians

In The Clouds"

On another front, I couldn't leave yesterday's Whip Out alone and this morning I just had to put another layer of detail on the foreground, like this:

"On They Rode, Part II"

      When I gave my talk on Geronimo last Tuesday to the WWII vets, I got this question: "Did any of Geronimo's children survive and where are they today?"

   Back in the early nineties, when I first started the Geronimo project, I drove over to the Mescalero Apache Reservation near Ruidoso, New Mexico and met Harlan Geronimo who claims to be a great grandson. My quest was to see how he smiled, because I had a hunch it would perhaps be like his great grandfather's grin, and I wasn't disappointed:

Harlan Geronimo, 1994

      If you look at photos of Geronimo you can see that he probably had a similar grin when he laughed. At least that's how I played it on paper.

The Famous Geronimo Smirk

   And speaking of lines on paper, I am concerned about declining skills which is inevitable with age.

   The Inevitable Decline

 “I can’t even draw a line now. I can’t even draw a line. I look at this stuff and I say, ‘How the hell did that guy do it?’”

—Mac Conner, 105, a master illustrator hero of mine, who died on September 26, in Manhattan

From Dust to Dust, And The Devil In The Dust

December 4, 2019

   Back on the dust wagon.

Apaches & Dust Devils
   All the tribes have a healthy respect and dread of dust devils. The Sinagua In-dins called them "sivulogi," and the word was uttered in a hushed whisper, out of respect, because they believed dust devils are evil spirits emerging from the ground.

A Retweak of A Retweak Daily Whip Out:

"Caught In A Dust Devil: The Last Place An Apache Ever Wants to Be"

Daily Whip Out: "On They Rode"

Daily Whip Out:

"Geronimo Approaches Juh's Stronghold"

Daily Sketchbook Whip Out: "Ridin' High"

Daily Whip Out: "Dust Devil Gigantus"

Daily Whip Out:

"Dust Storm In The Peloncillos"

Daily Whip Out: "Dust Storm at Black Hawk"

"Dust Storm In Z's Bathroom"

(full disclosure: I gifted this painting to Ms. Z at Z's Thai Food Restaurant next door to the True West World Headquarters and she put it in her bathroom.)

   And then, who can ever forget Dusty.

Daily Whip Out: "Dusty In Dust"

The Dust Deal

   See, here's the deal on me and dust. I actually hate it. I grew up in it, tasted it daily, and couldn't get it out of my clothes, or, out of my life, until I moved to Cave Creek where the wind rarely blows.

   So now I fondly remember it, at least in pictures. Such is life.

"My dad always said dust devils came up because the devil was moving around underground, causing a commotion."

—Carmen Villa Prezelski

Geronimo Retweaks And A Dust Up to Remember

December 3, 2019
   On the homestretch for choosing the final paintings for the art show at The Scottsdale Museum of The West in January. We've got about 25 picked and ready for framing (two are already framed) and so it comes down to the last five or six. This is one of them:

Daily Retweaked Whip Out:

"Geronimo Approaches Juh's Stronghold"

Daily Retweak Whip Out:

"Drunk As Lords"

    Last week I asked some of my friends to weigh in on these and Lynda Sanchez mentioned that her husband James didn't like "Apaches In The Mist" because they looked like ISIS fighters rather than Apaches.

Daily Whip Out:

"Apaches In The Mist"

Original

   Ha. He has a point. So I went home for lunch and took another swing at the painting:

Daily Retweak Whip Out:

"Apaches In The Mist"

   When I sent Lynda this version, she said, "Yes, it is much better.  The paint over the nose and the other tweaks make it easier to look at. should it be 'mist' or dust?  Dust is brown, mist is grey."

—Lynda Sanchez, Lincoln, New Mexico

   Oh, boy.

A Dust Up to Remember

   Speaking of dust and New Mexico, here is an old piece I did to illustrate what happens when drunk Republicans meet drunk Democrats on the town plaza in Mesilla, New Mexico.

Daily Whip Out: "Mesilla Melee"

   This is based on an actual event in 1871 when local New Mexican Republicans and Democrats took turns marching around the plaza in Mesilla with banners, slogans and dueling brass bands. This was during election season and as they drank more, they got louder and ruder, with both sides making threats. Finally, a Republican activist was beaned with an axe handle and the ball opened with both sides producing guns. Some 500 shots were fired and various reports place the dead as high as 15 and the wounded upwards of 50. The numbers are vague because neither side would admit to higher numbers for fear they would look weak.

    So, when people say it's bad now. . .

"Fascism is cured by reading, and racism is cured by traveling."

—Miguel de Unamuno

The Coffee Drinkers

December 2, 2019
   Had some fun this morning with campfire effects.

Daily Whip Out: "The Coffee Drinkers"

   Some of us believe coffee had more to do with the settling of the West than any other factor.

   How early did the gunfighter pose begin?

"Insurretos" at Juarez, Mexico 

   Looks like it might be 1911-15, so quite early for posing as bad boy shooters.

"I am not into exercise. If God wanted me to bend over, he would put diamonds on the floor."
—Joan Rivers

Geronimos On The Bubble

December 1, 2019
   I met with my curator, Kristi Jacobs, yesterday, and she pulled a couple paintings out of my reject pile and told me she thinks they should be in the Scottsdale Museum of The West art show on January 16.

Daily Whip Out: "Apache In Flames"

She also told me this one should be considered.

Daily Whip Out: "Apaches In The Mist"

And this one:

Daily Whip Out: "Four Star Rider"

     Now the sticking point is that none of these pieces are in the book so I am hesitant to include them in an art show which will be unveiled at the premiere of the book, but I also want the event to be successful and would like the best images to be represented.

   This is a tough one. I wonder what a pro would say?

"Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist."

—Pablo Picasso