MUST SEE, MUST READ
SHANE
(1949, by Jack Schaeffer): The classic, quintessentially Western story of a good guy with a gun who rides into a beautiful valley and meets a family of homesteaders struggling due to unrelenting pressure from cattlemen. Told from a kid’s perspective, Shane was originally published in three parts in Argosy magazine in 1946 under the title “Rider From Nowhere.”
Arapaho Journeys: Photographs and Stories From the Wind River Reservation (2011, by Sara Wiles): Stunning photographs and evocative writing put this contemporary book about the Northern Arapahos in a class of its own. Wiles, an award-winning photographer and writer, provides an inside look at the central Wyoming reservation.
Give Your Heart to the Hawks (1973, by Win Blevins): Since first reading this book in 1990 while on a backcountry horse pack trip in Yellowstone, I’ve had it on my Top 10 list. Suffice it to say the vivid scenes of mountain men encountering grizzlies really come to life when one is camping in grizzly country! The narrative celebrates such free-roaming real-life characters as John Colter, Jed Smith and Jim Bridger. Though the narrative reads like nonfiction, the dialogue puts it in the historical fiction category.
Homesteading and Ranching in the Upper Green River Valley (2021, by Ann Chambers Noble and Jonita Sommers): The depth of the authors’ historic research about early and present-day ranchers in the Upper Green River valley is clear. The contemporary narrative and photographs demonstrate how such families are working to conserve their ranches and maintain them in the face of encroaching development. Most of the images in this beautiful book were taken by local photographers.
Wyoming Range War: The Infamous Invasion of Johnson County (2010, by John W. Davis: This history goes beyond the violent drama that boiled over in Johnson County in 1892. An attorney by trade, author Davis mined the court records for details that add depth to this account. His approach, first employed in A Vast Amount of Trouble: A History of the Spring Creek Raid, blends deep research and accessible writing.
VIDEOS
(1953, Paramount,
