Reading on the Abbeville site articles about the South and the West, I was reminded of my newspaper piece on Florida as the Wild Wild (South) East, which had a popular run. It was inspired by a Frederic Remington article describing his adventures in Florida with cowboys in the 1880s. Our county (Marion, named for Gen. Francis Marion) was as big as all Rhode Island. It was big cattle country when we first moved there in 1956. You’d see working cowboys in worn boots and stained stetsons on the square.
Remington’s article had been loaned to me by the postmaster of Oklawaha (p.o. was a mile from our house), Willie Willis, who had arrived in the era in 1912 when the cowboy culture was alive and well. “Why I saw them right out that door” (pointing to main entrance). “They would ride the most dreadful horses, absolutely ‘varmints’…” (not surprising since their ponies existed off wiregrass) “and they always carried their long whips over their left shoulders with the ends trailing on the ground.”
More @ The Abbeville Institute
probably not much different than what the Tribes were riding.
ReplyDeleteJust sayin'.
Most white folks who came to America, and went west, probably got their horses from natives or Hispanic people from the Spanish Conquistadors, as horses were not native to North Amecica until they were introduced.
I'm not a racist. But you can go right ahead and accuse me.
:)
DeleteMy mother and one of her sisters had a black wet nurse and I have a loving picture.