This Week in the West

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 88: Richard King - From Stowaway to Ranching Legend 📢 Episode Summary: This week, This Week in the West tells the remarkable story of Richard King, whose journey from a poor Irish runaway in 1830s New York to one of the most influential ranchers in American history is one of the greatest success stories of the American West. After stowing away on a ship as a chi...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 87: The Finely Detailed Life of Western Artist Tom Lovell 📢 Episode Summary: llustrator and painter Tom Lovell became one of the most respected artists of the American West by combining meticulous historical research with exceptional storytelling. Although he grew up in New York City, his fascination with Native American history began in childhood museum visits...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 86: A German Duke Explores the Frontier  📢 Episode Summary: Born into European royalty in 1797, Duke Paul Wilhelm of Württemberg chose a life of exploration rather than courtly comfort. Inspired by the scientific curiosity of the age and the work of naturalist Alexander von Humboldt, he traveled to North America in 1822 and spent years exploring the Mississippi...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 85: Dispelling the Myths Surrounding Geronimo 📢 Episode Summary: Geronimo, born Goyahkla—or "One Who Yawns"—in 1829, grew up among the Chiricahua Apache in what is now Arizona, New Mexico and northern Mexico. His life changed forever in 1851 when Mexican soldiers attacked his camp and killed his mother, wife and children while he was away. The tragedy fueled a l...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 84: Louis L’Amour, The West’s Great Storyteller 📢 Episode Summary: Louis L’Amour became one of the most influential Western writers in history not because he imagined the West from afar, but because he lived much of it himself. Born in North Dakota in 1908, he spent his early adulthood traveling the American West, working as a ranch hand, miner, lumber camp labo...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 82: Andy Payne and the Brutal Craziness of the Bunion Derby 📢 Episode Summary: In this episode of This Week in The West, listeners travel back to 1928 for one of the strangest and toughest athletic events in American history: the Transcontinental Footrace, better known as the “Bunion Derby.” Created by sports promoter Charles C. Pyle, the race challenged nearly...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 81: Edward Borein and the Authentic West  📢 Episode Summary: This episode of This Week in The West explores the life and legacy of Western artist and cowboy Edward Borein, whose work helped preserve an authentic visual record of the American West. The episode opens with Borein’s early years in California, where he watched cattle drives as a child and quickly dev...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 80: Jim Shoulders, the Babe Ruth of Rodeo 📢 Episode Summary: This episode of This Week in The West explores the life and legacy of rodeo legend Jim Shoulders, often called the “Babe Ruth of Rodeo.” Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on May 13, 1928, Shoulders grew from a city kid with dreams of cowboy life into one of the most dominant athletes in rodeo history. The episo...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 79: The Monumental Effort to Create the Transcontinental Railroad  📢 Episode Summary: This episode of This Week in The West commemorates the anniversary of the completion of the transcontinental railroad on May 10, 1869. The story opens at Promontory Summit in Utah Territory, where the Union Pacific and Central Pacific railroads met in a historic moment symboliz...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 78: The Wild Western Life of Artist Olaf Wieghorst 📢 Episode Summary: This episode of This Week in the West explores the remarkable life of Western artist Olaf Wieghorst, a man whose story reads like the very scenes he would later paint. Born in Denmark in 1899, Wieghorst developed an early fascination with horses while performing as a child acrobat and circus r...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️Episode 77: Naturalist John Muir's Vision of Preserving the West 📢 Episode Summary: This episode tells the remarkable story of John Muir, whose life changed forever after a factory accident in 1867 temporarily blinded him. When his vision returned, Muir saw it as a second chance and chose to leave behind industrial life to pursue a deeper connection with the natural worl...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 76: Glenna Goodacre, Reagan’s Sculptor and More  📢 Episode Summary: Glenna Goodacre’s life and work reveal the power of sculpture to tell deeply human stories rooted in history, emotion and place. Best known for her bronze statue After the Ride of President Ronald Reagan at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum, Goodacre had a gift for capturing pers...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 75: How James Garner re-defined the Western hero  📢 Episode Summary: James Garner’s story begins in Norman, Oklahoma, with a difficult childhood marked by loss, hardship and an uncertain future. After leaving school early, he worked a series of jobs before serving in both World War II and the Korean War, where he was wounded twice and earned two Purple Hearts. A...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 74: Jo Decker and the Importance of Rodeo Secretaries 📢 Episode Summary: Jo Ramsey Decker stood at the center of rodeo’s evolution, bridging the gap between competitor and organizer at a time when the sport was still finding its footing. From her early days growing up on a Texas ranch to competing in rodeos as a child, Decker developed a deep connection to Weste...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 73: John Arbuckle and Coffee's Importance in the West 📢 Episode Summary: This episode of This Week in The West explores the surprising but essential role coffee played in shaping life on the American frontier, focusing on the legacy of John Arbuckle. At a time when coffee was difficult to preserve and inconsistent in quality, Arbuckle revolutionized the industry...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 72: Charles Russell: Artist & Original Great Westerner 📢 Episode Summary: This week on This Week in The West, we remember Charles Marion Russell, one of the most important artists to ever capture the spirit of the American frontier. Born March 19, 1864, Russell left his comfortable home in St. Louis at just sixteen years old to pursue his dream of becoming a...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 71: The Miller Brothers and the Rise of the 101 Ranch 📢 Episode Summary: This week on This Week in The West, we remember Joe Miller Sr., one of the driving forces behind Oklahoma’s legendary 101 Ranch. Born March 12, 1868, Miller grew up in a cattle family that helped shape ranching in Indian Territory. After their father, Colonel George Washington Miller, estab...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 70: How Jesse Chisholm Talked His Way Into Western History 📢 Episode Summary: This week on This Week in The West, we remember Jesse Chisholm, the man whose name became permanently attached to one of the most famous cattle trails in American history. Yet Chisholm himself was not a cowboy or cattle baron. Born around 1805 to a Scottish father and a Cherokee mother...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 69: Quanah Parker, Remarkable Native Leader 📢 Episode Summary: This week on This Week in The West, we remember Quanah Parker, the famed Comanche leader, on the anniversary of his death on February 23, 1911. Born the son of Comanche war chief Peta Nocona and Cynthia Ann Parker—a white woman captured and raised among the Comanche—Quanah grew up fully immersed in C...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 68: Albert Bierstadt's Larger-Than-Life Artistic Journey 📢 Episode Summary: This episode of This Week in The West explores the life and legacy of artist Albert Bierstadt through one of the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum’s most breathtaking works, Emigrants Crossing the Plains. Known for his massive, dramatic landscapes, Bierstadt didn’t simply doc...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 67: Laura Ingalls Wilder, Little House Author’s Version of Pioneer Life 📢 Episode Summary: This episode of This Week in The West explores the life and legacy of Laura Ingalls Wilder, whose Little House books shaped how generations of Americans imagine frontier life. Born in 1867, Wilder grew up in a constantly moving pioneer family that faced illegal settlement...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 66: Belle Starr, Queen of the Outlaws 📢 Episode Summary: Belle Starr’s life sits at the uneasy intersection of fact and legend, shaped as much by mythmaking as by crime. Born in Missouri in 1848 and educated in refinement, the Civil War upended her world and drew her into outlaw circles that included Confederate guerrillas and future members of the James-Younger...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 65: Casey Tibbs, Rodeo’s Golden Boy 📢 Episode Summary: This episode of This Week in The West explores the extraordinary life and legacy of Casey Tibbs, one of the most influential figures in rodeo history. Born into a hard-scrabble homesteading family in South Dakota, Tibbs ignored his father’s doubts about rodeo and launched a career that would redefine the spo...

🤠This Week in the West 🎙️ Episode 64: The Hollywood Drama of Broncho Billy Anderson  📢 Episode Summary: In this episode of This Week in The West, we remember Broncho Billy Anderson, one of the very first cowboy movie stars and a true pioneer of American cinema. Born Maxwell Henry Aronson in 1880 to Jewish immigrant parents, Anderson found his way from stage performances and odd acting jobs into...