Mike Kearby (born 1952) is an American novelist [1] and inventor. [2] Since 2005, Kearby has published twelve novels and two graphic novels.
Kearby was born in Mineral Wells, Texas, [3] and received a B.S. from North Texas State University (now the University of North Texas) in 1972. He worked in the irrigation industry for 20 years where he obtained patents 5,762,270, 5,992,760, 6,478,237, 6,155,493, 6,209,801. He taught high school English and reading for 10 years and created "The Collaborative Novella Project". [4] The project allows future authors to go through the novel writing process from idea to published work. Kearby began novel writing in 2005 and has completed twelve novels, two graphic novels, and written the afterword to the TCU Press 2010 release of western novelist's, Elmer Kelton, The Far Away Canyon. [5]
Ambush at Mustang Canyon was a finalist for the 2008 Spur Awards. [6]
A Hundred Miles to Water was awarded the 2011 Will Rogers Medallion Award for Best Adult Fiction. [7]
Texas Tales Illustrated: The Texas Revolution was awarded the 2012 Will Rogers Medallion for Best YA Non-Fiction. [8]
Men of Color was awarded Best Script / Winner from the Hill Country Film Festival, [9] The Los Angeles Movie Awards, [10] and The Indie Gathering Film Festival. [11]
Long Term Parking produced in 2013. [12]
Kearby was presented a Western Heritage award in 2016 from the National Cowboy Museum for Texas Tales Illustrated: The Trail Drives. [13]
The Problem with Time Travel was Grand Prize Winner at Table Read My Screenplay Austin in 2019. [14] [15]
The Problem with Time Travel was Grand Prize Winner at the HollyShorts Film Festival in 2020. [16]
The Problem with Time Travel had its premiere in Hollywood at the TL Chinese Theaters in August 2022. [17] [18]
Roy Rogers, nicknamed the King of the Cowboys, was an American singer, actor, television host, and rodeo performer.
Finis Dean Smith was an American track and field athlete, winner of a gold medal in the 4 × 100 m relay at the 1952 Summer Olympics; he was also an actor and noted stuntman, appearing in many films and TV series.
The National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum is a museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States, with more than 28,000 Western and American Indian art works and artifacts. The facility also has the world's most extensive collection of American rodeo photographs, barbed wire, saddlery, and early rodeo trophies. Museum collections focus on preserving and interpreting the heritage of the American West. The museum becomes an art gallery during the annual Prix de West Invitational Art Exhibition and Sale each June. The Prix de West Artists sell original works of art as a fund raiser for the museum. The expansion and renovation was designed by Curtis W. Fentress, FAIA, RIBA of Fentress Architects.
Mike J. Nichols is a producer, director, writer, and an American film editor originally from Illinois currently living and working in Los Angeles.
Joe Richard Lansdale is an American writer and martial arts instructor. A prose writer in a variety of genres, including Western, horror, science fiction, mystery, and suspense, he has also written comic books and screenplays. Several of his novels have been adapted for film and television. He is the winner of the British Fantasy Award, the American Horror Award, the Edgar Award, and eleven Bram Stoker Awards.
Mack White is a comics writer and artist who lives in Texas.
Western lifestyle or cowboy culture is the lifestyle, or behaviorisms, of, and resulting from the influence of, the attitudes, ethics and history of the American Western cowboy. In the present day these influences affect this sector of the population's choice of recreation, clothing, and consumption of goods.
Elmer Kelton was an American author, known for his Westerns. He was born in Andrews County, Texas.
Cynthia Leitich Smith is a New York Times best-selling author of fiction for children and young adults.
Stephen Harrigan is an American novelist, journalist and screenwriter. He is best known as the author of the bestselling The Gates of the Alamo, for other novels such as Remember Ben Clayton and A Friend of Mr. Lincoln, and for his magazine work in Texas Monthly.
Kathleen O'Neal Gear is an American archaeologist, historian, and New York Times bestselling author or co-author of 57 books and over 200 non-fiction publications. The United States Department of the Interior awarded her two Special Achievement Awards for outstanding contributions to the protection of America's archaeological, historical, and cultural resources. In 2015, she was honored by the United States Congress with a Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition. In 2021 she won the Owen Wister Award for lifetime contributions to western literature, and was inducted into the Western Writers Hall of Fame. In 2023 she received the Frank Waters Award for "a body of work representing excellence in writing and storytelling that embodies the spirit of the American West." Her novels have been published in 29 languages.
This is a list of the works of fiction which have won the Spur Award for Best Western Novel:
Will Hobbs is the American author of twenty novels for upper elementary, middle school and young adult readers, as well as two picture book stories. Hobbs credits his sense of audience to his fourteen years of teaching reading and English in southwest Colorado. When he turned to writing, he set his stories mostly in wild places he knew from firsthand experience. Hobbs has said he wants to “take young people into the outdoors and engage their sense of wonder.” Bearstone, his second novel, gained national attention when it took the place of Where the Red Fern Grows as the unabridged novel in Prentice-Hall’s 7th grade literature anthology. Downriver and Far North were selected by the American Library Association for its list of the 100 Best Young Adult Books of the 20th century.
The Academy of Western Artists, based in Gene Autry, Oklahoma, is an organization that honors individuals who have preserved and perpetuated the heritage of the American cowboy, through rodeo, music, poetry, campfire and chuckwagon cooking, and western and ranch clothing and gear.
Anne Windfohr Marion was an American heiress, rancher, horse breeder, business executive, philanthropist, and art collector from Fort Worth, Texas. She served as the president of Burnett Ranches and the chairman of the Burnett Oil Company. She was the founder of the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe, New Mexico. In 1981, she was inducted into the Hall of Great Westerners of the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum.
Mike Blakely is an American novelist and singer/songwriter, focusing on Western subjects. He lives in, and is closely associated with, the U.S. state of Texas.
Matthew P. Mayo is an American author of novels and non-fiction books, poetry, short stories, articles, and reviews. He writes about the American West, New England, and in the Western, humor, crime, and horror genres.
Carolyn Louise Brown is an American author of romance and women's fiction. She has written more than 100 novels, 8 novellas, and has contributed to multiple anthologies.
Sidney Thompson is an American author, academic, and writing consultant who teaches at Texas Christian University.
Judy Alter is an American novelist and author of both fiction and nonfiction for adults and young adults. Alter writes primarily about the history and literature of Texas and the American West, especially the experiences of women in the nineteenth century. She has also written sixteen cozy mysteries, primarily set in Texas. Over fifty of her young adult non-fiction books have been published for school libraries by Franklin Watts and Scholastic.