Roy Rogers, nicknamed the King of the Cowboys, was an American singer, actor, television host, freemason and rodeo performer.
Woodward Maurice "Tex" Ritter was a pioneer of American Country music, a popular singer and actor from the mid-1930s into the 1960s, and the patriarch of the Ritter acting family. He is a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame.
The Sons of the Pioneers are one of the United States' earliest Western singing groups. Known for their vocal performances, their musicianship, and their songwriting, they produced innovative recordings that have inspired many Western music performers and remained popular through the years. Since 1933, through many changes in membership, the Sons of the Pioneers have remained one of the longest-surviving country music vocal groups.
Michael Martin Murphey is an American singer-songwriter. He was one of the founding artists of progressive country. A multiple Grammy nominee, Murphey has six gold albums, including Cowboy Songs, the first album of cowboy music to achieve gold status since Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs by Marty Robbins in 1959. He has recorded the hit singles "Wildfire", "Carolina in the Pines", "What's Forever For", "A Long Line of Love", "What She Wants", "Don't Count the Rainy Days", and "Maybe This Time". Murphey is also the author of New Mexico's state ballad, "The Land of Enchantment". Murphey has become a prominent musical voice for the Western horseman, rancher, and cowboy.
Western music is a form of music composed by and about the people who settled and worked throughout the Western United States and Western Canada. Western music celebrates the lifestyle of the cowboy on the open range, along the Rocky Mountains, and among the prairies of Western North America. The genre grew from the mix of cultural influences in the American frontier and what became the Southwestern United States at the time, it came from the folk music traditions of those living the region, those being the hillbilly music from those that arrived from the Eastern U.S., the corrido and ranchera from Northern Mexico, and the New Mexico and Tejano endemic to the Southwest. The music industry of the mid-20th century grouped the western genre with that of similar folk origins, instrumentation and rural themes, to create the banner of country and western music, which was simplified in time to country music.
Bob Nolan was a Canadian-born American singer, songwriter, and actor. He was a founding member of the Sons of the Pioneers, and composer of numerous Country music and Western music songs, including the standards "Cool Water" and "Tumbling Tumbleweeds." He is generally regarded as one of the finest Western songwriters of all time. As an actor and singer he appeared in scores of Western films.
Christopher Lee LeDoux was an American country music singer-songwriter, bronze sculptor, and hall of fame rodeo champion. During his career, LeDoux recorded 36 albums, which have sold more than six million units in the United States as of January 2007. He was awarded two gold and one platinum album certifications from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), was nominated for a Grammy Award, and was honored with the Academy of Country Music Cliffie Stone Pioneer Award. LeDoux is also the only person to participate and also perform at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo.
Cowboy culture is the set of behaviors, preferences, and appearances associated with the attitudes, ethics, and history of the American cowboy. The term can describe the content or stylistic appearance of an artistic representation, often built on romanticized impressions of the wild west, or certain aspects of people's lifestyle, such as their choices in recreation, apparel, and western or southwestern cuisine.
The National Ranching Heritage Center, located on the Texas Tech University campus in Lubbock, Texas, is a unique museum dedicated to preserving and celebrating the history and heritage of ranching in the United States. Established in 1971, the center sits on a 27-acre historical park and features a collection of authentic ranching structures ranging from the 1780s to 1950s that tell the story of ranching in North America.
George Forbes Ellis was a cattleman, pioneer in the field of beef cattle production, and a published writer. Born in Portales, New Mexico Territory on May 11, 1903, he graduated from the Kansas State Agricultural College in Manhattan, Kansas in animal husbandry.
Texas country music is a subgenre of country music from Texas. Texas country is a style of Western music and is often associated with other distinct neighboring styles, including Red Dirt from Oklahoma, the New Mexico music of New Mexico, and Tejano in Texas, all of which have influenced one another over the years, and are popular throughout Texas, the Midwest, the Southwest, and other parts of the Western United States. Texas Country is known for fusing neotraditional country with the outspoken, care-free views of outlaw country. Texas Country blends these sub-genres with a "common working man" theme and witty undertones, these often combine with a stripped down music sound.
Russell "Red" Steagall is an American actor, musician, poet, and stage performer, who focuses on American Western and country music genres.
Heartland Cowboy: Cowboy Songs, Vol. 5 is the twenty-seventh album by American singer-songwriter Michael Martin Murphey, his fifth album of cowboy songs. The album includes the hit song "Long and Lonesome Ride to Dalhart", which won the 2006 Wrangler Award for Outstanding Original Western Composition. The album was inspired by Murphey's life on his ranch and his real experiences working as an activist and artist in American Ranching and Farming.
James Clarence Wakely was an American actor, songwriter, country music vocalist, and one of the last singing cowboys. During the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, he released records, appeared in several B-Western movies with most of the major studios, appeared on radio and television and even had his own series of comic books. His duet singles with Margaret Whiting from 1949 until 1951, produced a string of top seven hits, including 1949's number one hit on the US country chart and pop music chart, "Slippin' Around". Wakely owned two music publishing companies in later years, and performed at the Grand Ole Opry until shortly before his death.
The Bronze Wrangler is an award presented annually by the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum to honor the top works in Western music, film, television and literature.
Warren Granger "Freckles" Brown was a hall of fame American rodeo cowboy from Wheatland, Wyoming. His career spanned from 1937 to 1974, competing in bull riding, saddle bronc riding, bareback bronc riding, team roping, and steer wrestling. He was the World Bull Riding Champion in 1962. Brown was inducted into the ProRodeo Hall of Fame in Colorado Springs, Colorado, for bull riding in 1979. He was also inducted into the inaugural class of the Bull Riding Hall of Fame in Fort Worth, Texas, in 2015. Brown was most famous for riding Tornado, who had an undefeated record of 220 riders. Brown was also a close friend and mentor of Lane Frost.
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.
Buck Ramsey, born Kenneth Melvin Ramsey, was an American cowboy poet and singer. He earned a national reputation for preserving cowboy lore and traditions.
Bill Barwick was an American Western music singer-songwriter, guitarist, and voiceover artist based in Colorado.
Tornado was an American bucking bull. He went to the National Finals Rodeo (NFR) at least four times. He was voted Bucking Bull of the NFR four times consecutively from 1962 to 1965. Owned by rodeo champion Jim Shoulders, Tornado was named the "meanest bull alive" at the NFR four times. Tornado is best known for his matchup with ProRodeo Hall of Fame bull rider, Freckles Brown, which is most often referred to as "The Ride." It was Brown who, in 1967, broke Tornado's undefeated streak of 220 buckoffs in six years. Tornado, Brown, and Shoulders all have been recorded in The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture maintained online by the Oklahoma Historical Society. Tornado was inducted into the ProRodeo Hall of Fame 1979 and the Bull Riding Hall of Fame in 2016.
