This book details the story of a young man, a fictional character, Clem Barnett, during the late 1940's and 1950's, raised as a boy in the mid-west with dreams and visions, based on romantic books and movies, of being a cowboy in the West. He finds himself venturing far from his home in northeastern Oklahoma to hire-out on two very different ranches; first, one in Montana and later, one in Idaho. There, he learns about ranching, the cattle business, and most importantly, about life. He also learns what the modern, for the time period, cowboy is and how it differs greatly from his romantic vision. He faces many adventures and interacts with a host of colorful characters in search of his dreams. Because the story occurs in the early 1950's, the young man is faced with the horrors of participating in the Korean War, and more importantly, facing the emotional effects thereafter. Unlikely characters assist in his recovery and he gains respect and love for the people of the Basque culture who helped him. The story ends with a simple love story and a realization that dreams can be elusive. In the end, he finds peace and happiness and seems to come close to living the life of the romantic cowboy he envisioned. Others see in him a person who so loves the life of a cowboy and confers upon him the title of the last romantic, real life, American Cowboy.

THE LAST AMERICAN COWBOY

By Mike R. Dunbar

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2009 Mike R. Dunbar
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4490-0238-1

Chapter One

HEADING WEST

Clickity klack, clickity klack, clickity klack........................., the train seemed to glide over the vast prairies of western Oklahoma. The distant horizon.... endless in every direction. These are the flat lands; the wheat fields and cattle pastures stretch un-broken, as far as the eye can see, with not a tree, shrub or rock to break the monotony. Occasionally broken down wind mills can be seen standing as a testament to the harshness of the land; a constant reminder that nature still rules. In this country, wind is the enemy and a constant force with which to be reckoned. Some try as best they can to pump water from far below the surface to stock tanks where cattle gather to drink, lie, sleep, and bake in the sun. The sun, the eternal sun, constantly fries and sears the earth and all that inhabit it. The windbreaks; those ever so pathetic thin lines of trees stand un-kept and un-tended, left over from the days of the dust bowl. Even now, in 1948, they stand alone against the relentless wind; trying feebly to protect the soil they were tasked to do so long ago. Not knowing that those who asked them to perform the task are now gone and those that remain have forgotten any assignments were ever given.

Suddenly, from out of nowhere, a cloud of yellow-grey dust appears. And, as the train passes, a weathered, old man on a tractor emerges from the cloud he and his tractor have themselves created while working the dry earth, waving at the travelers passing by on the train, that he obviously couldn't see. Clem started to instinctively return the wave, but withdrew his hand, knowing the man would never see him. "Why would anyone live here?" Clem asked himself. The only answer that made any sense was that they were born here. They probably didn't know of any other life. Maybe they never had dreams or never knew that there were other places on earth to live that were less harsh, less un-inviting. "But who am I," thought Clem, "to make such a judgment?" These people probably believed as surely as there is a God in heaven that this was the best place on the planet. They probably wished to live nowhere else. This was their home. This was their heaven. "Maybe Oklahoma is my home," thought Clem. "Maybe the place on earth I have selected, the West, is an illusion, a mere dream, a distant horizon, having no reality, no substance."

"Have I made a terrible mistake?" he asked himself, as his mind became dulled by the monotonic sounds of the train. Will the West he had read about in all those wonderful books, the stories of cattle barons, cowboys, and adventures, be a foreign place to him just as it undoubtedly would be to the people who live here on these prairies? To the man on the tractor? But, he had to remember why he was leaving Oklahoma. Why he had decided to go west. He knew when he made that decision it was the only decision he could make. He loved his grandparents dearly. If it weren't for them he didn't know where he would be, probably raised in an orphanage. But when his mom died, they were there for him. If it weren't for them, he wouldn't have these ideas, these dreams. Well, maybe it wasn't all because of them. His dad certainly had a lot to do with trying to teach him about dreams and trying to make dreams come true.

Dad. No matter how hard he tried, he knew he could never forget that night when his mom told him that his father was dead; killed in that awful accident. "A freak accident," they said. "Happened only rarely to cowboys on the rodeo circuit," they said. Rarely does a bull just fall on top of a cowboy. A top bull rider like dad. Dad, a first- rate bull rider. "Dead," his mom said. "Your father is dead." He will never forget those awful words. Terrible words for a ten-year-old boy. "Your father, Jim Barnett, is dead. Killed by a bull at the Cheyenne rodeo."

But Clem knew his father had his own dreams; to be the top bull rider, to be cheered by the crowds, to make a good living for his family, for him and his mom to be proud of him. A top bull rider. The best. It was the only thing his dad knew how to do. He had done it for so long, he didn't know how to do anything else. He loved it. Clem used to love hearing his dad tell the stories about the rodeo, the towns, the cowboys, the bronc riders, bareback and saddlebronc, calf ropers and steer wrestlers, the bad bulls, the good rides, the stories Clem could listen to time and again. Sometimes the same stories, sometimes different. He could remember his mother's face, excited, and her wide eyes as she sat listening to the stories, the dreams of her husband. The dreams they all shared. The biggest and best rodeos. What a great life they would all have.... someday. The good times would soon be there for them all. Then.... the words...., "your father is dead." With those few words went the promise of good times, gone were the dreams.

There were many days of sorrow following those words..... and loneliness. Mom was often away. Alcohol became her friend. Alcohol was her method of escape. It devoured her soul and eventually her life. They said she died of alcoholism. That was what he was told. But that wasn't the real truth. Even a ten year old boy knew what a broken heart was; knew that a broken heart can kill. Kill just as easily and surely as a ton of bull crushing bones and liver and lungs.

After the funeral, there were his grandparents. Holding him. Assuring him of their love. They had loved their son, their only son. To have him killed in the prime of his life was tragic for them as well. They would never forget.

"It all seems so senseless," Clem remembered his grandfather saying. "So senseless."

But, the years passed. Life on the farm near Tahlequah, Oklahoma with his grandparents was a good life for a young boy. Better than living in Tulsa where his parents had lived. He enjoyed working the farm with his grandparents. His grandparents raised cattle and horses and grew a few crops. His grandfather was not only a farmer, but a hunter, well, a fox hunter, anyway. Actually, the fox hounds, not he, did the hunting. He and his grandfather and occasionally one or two other fox hunters with their assortment of hounds, Red Bones, Running Walkers, Trigs, and other breeds, would often sit out at night in some lonely place, and while stoking a campfire and passing around a jug of moonshine whisky, listen to the hounds. Listen to their bark and yip, coarse mouths, fine mouths, while chasing red fox, gray fox. Finally, Clem dosed off in a sleep, lulled by the monotonous sounds of the train as it raced across Kansas and Nebraska, remembering his life on a farm in northeastern Oklahoma and where his dreams would soon take him.

Suddenly, he was awakened by the clash and banging of the train slowing for its next stop. "Where are we?" Clem mumbled to the man sitting next to him, while rubbing his eyes.

"Cheyenne!" said the stranger.

"Cheyenne, Wyoming?" asked Clem.

"Where else?" said the man, apparently irritated by the question, as he began to get out of his seat.

"Cheyenne!" yelled the conductor, a thin, lanky, grey-haired man, adjusting his eye glasses that had fallen down on his nose. "Everybody off.......... changing trains for all those not going on to Deadwood."

As Clem looked out the window, he could see the hustle and bustle of what seemed to be a city, but he knew that Cheyenne was not a city, but only a hub, a train hub and a hub for cattle markets....