Dave Stamey - Shopworn Advice

Written by Jameson Parker on 26 July 2011.

The acclaimed musician rode a wide circle as his career developed. The cowboy, packer and former novelist draws upon firsthand experiences to fuel his songs.

The shopworn advice to young authors: write what you know. Dave Stamey has taken that advice to heart, but it was a rocky beginning, one typical of the ranching and cowboy life. He was born in Montana, east of Billings, where the prairie meets the mountains.

"My dad was a rancher, but when the cattle market went bust, he lost the ranch," Dave says. "So when I was 12, we moved to the central coast of California and he opened a feeder operation. Then Nixon got into a fight with the Russians and enacted a grain embargo that made the cattle cost more to keep alive than to kill.

"I got interested in music and started playing the guitar around that time, but I was also interested in writing. No one in my family did either one of those things, so they were a little confused. They were supportive, but they didn't understand."

How a Yellow Rose Helped Win a Revolution

Written by Administrator on 21 April 2011.

emilylrge On the morning of April 21, a beautiful young lady, Emily D. West, served breakfast for Mexican General Santa Anna in his tent.

Young Emily was captured by the Mexican army 5 days earlier. Her beauty caught the eye of General Santa Anna. It seems that Santa Anna fancied himself as quite the ladies man and had weakness for beautiful women.

That morning, General Sam Houston climbed a tree to spy into the Mexican camp. Upon seeing Emily go into Santa Anna's tent with a champaign breakfast, he reportedly remarked "I hope that girl makes him [Santa Anna] neglect his business and keeps him in bed all day."

By afternoon, the great final battle for the independence of Texas was engaged. The Mexican army was caught completely by surprise, and Santa Anna was literally caught "with his pants down." The Mexican army was defeated in less than 20 minutes.

Emily's peculiar role in the decisive Battle of San Jacinto was immortalized in the song "The Yellow Rose of Texas."

Contributors

Written by Administrator on 18 April 2011.

Michelle Anderson started her career as an editor at Appaloosa Journal and later worked as associate editor of John Lyons’ Perfect Horse. Since 1999, she’s earned multiple awards from American Horse Publications and has written for the industry’s leading magazines. She currently works in marketing and takes the occasional gig writing about horses and the Western lifestyle. She and her husband live on a small ranch outside Bend, Oregon, and enjoy horse camping and trail riding.

Based in Montana, Ryan T. Bell chronicles cowboy life and backcountry experiences in the Rocky Mountains. As a cowboy journalist, he's ridden with the gauchos of Argentina, the nomads of Mongolia, and the comrade cowboys of Russia. Learn more about his travels at:ryantbell.com.

Photographer, writer and professional tumbleweed Lynn Donaldson grew up on her family’s farm in central Montana. She credits her love of gravel roads, cowboy diners and “truckin’ songs” to her parents, whose idea of “vacation” was hitting the highway in their giant Oldsmobile. “I learned early on that blasting across the countryside, tasting local food and collecting handmade souvenirs is the fastest way to get to the heart and soul of a region,” she says. Donaldson lives in Livingston, Montana, with her husband and three children. The stories she writes and shoots for magazines such as Via, Travel + Leisure, Sunsetand Men’s Journaloften focus on local food and art. “The more back road, the better.”

Kathy McCraine grew up on a ranch in Arizona and has been involved with ranching all her life. After graduating from the University of Arizona, she wrote for and edited several cattle and horse publications, then founded one of the first advertising agencies to specialize in livestock. Most recently, she authored Cow Country Cooking: Recipes and Tales from Northern Arizona’s Historic Ranches. Kathy and her husband, Swayze, own and operate Campwood Cattle Company near Prescott, Arizona, where they raise commercial cattle and registered Quarter Horses.

Jameson Parker is the author of the critically acclaimed memoir An Accidental Cowboy(St. Martin’s Press) and the editor of the popular anthology To Absent Friends (Willow Creek Press). In keeping with his theory that any man who fails to live beyond his means suffers from a total lack of imagination, he lives with more horses, dogs, and cats than he can afford, and with a patient and long-suffering wife, the former actress Darleen Carr.