Trail gone cold: Dusty Richards.

The world lost something big last week. And in that part of the world known as the American West, the loss looms even larger.

Dusty Richards died January 19 from lingering injuries suffered in a traffic accident. Dusty’s death means we’re short one of our finest Western writers, a long-time rodeo announcer, and a lively auctioneer. As if that weren’t enough to fill a lifetime, Dusty also had a successful career in agribusiness, taught school, and broadcast farm reports on television. He served as president of Western Writers of America and was founder and executive editor of Saddlebag Dispatches magazine. And 150 or so Western novels are filled with Dusty’s words. Some of those books have his name on the cover; many he wrote using other names.

Besides all that, and more important than any of it, Dusty was friendly, sociable, kind, and helpful to any- and everybody, anytime. You couldn’t begin to count the number of aspiring writers Dusty helped along the way with encouragement, advice, introductions, referrals, recommendations, and more. I count myself among those he helped, and couldn’t count on all my fingers and toes all the times he went out of his way to show me how to be a writer.

It bears mentioning that Pat, his wife and friend and constant companion, is also lost to us owing to the same accident. We can take comfort in the fact that they are back together after a brief time apart.

And we can rest assured knowing that Dusty is, at this very moment, no doubt bending the ear of Saint Peter—and anyone else within range of his big voice—with an engaging story about the West he loves.

Kansas City, here we come.

That title—a stolen line from a classic song—isn’t true, but it is more melodious than the factual “Kansas City, there we’ve been.” Last week was the annual Western Writers of America convention, held, as you have probably guessed, in Kansas City. 

Always a high point in the year, the WWA convention gives me the chance to learn a few new things, meet a few new writers, and, best of all, spend some time with writers I’ve met at earlier conventions and who have become friends. I find that hanging around with people who are smarter than I am (they are not hard to find) is always stimulating.

The only downside to the convention is that the family members who travel with me get to spend their days seeing all manner of interesting places and things while I am at meetings. But I do get to tuck in a few such visits now and then and see things I’ve never seen before—like the Arabia Steamboat Museum, home to 200 tons of artifacts recovered from a steamboat that sank in 1856 and was recovered 132 years later from deep under a cornfield. More about that another day.

Next summer, WWA convenes in Billings, Montana. I’ve been there for one reason or another several times over the years, and am already looking forward to returning to Big Sky Country.

“Goodbye, Old Paint…

…I’m leavin’ Cheyenne.”

Truth be told, unlike that classic cowboy song lyric, I’ve already left Cheyenne. We were there last week for the annual Western Writers of America convention.

As usual, the WWA convention was a good time. I saw lots of fellow writers who’ve become friends over the years, and I met some who likely will become friends. I sat in some interesting panel discussions and presentations and visited some interesting historic sites in the area. And, to repeat myself, my novel Rawhide Robinson Rides the Tabby Trail: TheTrue Tale of a Wild West CATastrophe received a handsome certificate as a Finalist for the Spur Award for Best Western Juvenile Fiction, a book suitable for readers from junior high age to geriatric.

Without a doubt, the highlight of the convention was the acceptance of a Spur Award for Best Western Storyteller by young author JoJo Thoreau, author of the illustrated children’s book Buckaroo Bobbie Sue. Calling her young is not an exaggeration—JoJo is nine years old.

Which is certainly a novelty.

But her book and her Spur Award are no novelty. She’s an honest-to-goodness writer and Buckaroo Bobbie Sue is an honest–to-goodness book. It‘s the colorfully illustrated rhyming story of a young girl’s wish to, as we say in the cowboy trade, “make a hand,” and her rise to heroics at the right minute.

I played a small role in the making of the book and am pleased as punch that JoJo (who’s too young to know better) trusted me help out.

Leaving Cheyenne wasn’t easy, but at least as we rode out of town “leading Old Dan” we left with saddlebags full of fine memories—including meeting in person the budding—but already accomplished—author JoJo Thoreau.

 

Good Luck, Dale Walker.

There are many factors that play into achieving any sort of success as a writer. One of them is luck.

One of the luckiest things that ever happened to me when it comes to writing was meeting Dale Walker. Dale was one of those larger-than-life characters I first encountered at a Western Writers of America convention when the author paint on me wasn’t dry. He was a past president, past Roundup editor, past several other things in the group, and revered, it seemed, among the entire membership. He also edited the novels of many admirable writers and was a respected author of nonfiction himself. Being the socially awkward type I am, I admired him from a distance.

Then, still not long after I became a WWA member, the organization announced the creation of a fiftieth anniversary anthology with Dale as the editor. Not knowing any better, I submitted a story.

I saw Dale at the next WWA convention and screwed up the courage to introduce myself. He hinted that my story would be in the anthology. It would be, outside of some success with poetry, my first publication of any note.

It must have been at the next year’s convention or one soon after that I again screwed up my courage and handed Dale a proposal for a novel. He tracked me down the next day and said it was one of the best proposals he had ever seen—but, unfortunately, the publisher he represented wasn’t inviting any new authors into their Western line.

But he asked if I knew anything about a guy named John Muir. As it happened, I knew a bit more about the man than Dale did and related one of my favorite Muir stories about his riding out a Sierra windstorm perched in the top of a tree just for the fun of it. Dale said he was working on a project and may get back to me. Later that day, or perhaps the next, he took me aside again and asked if I would like to write a book about John Muir for a new nonfiction series—“American Heroes”—he was editing for Forge Books.

Just like that, I became a writer of books. All because I had the good luck to meet a man named Dale Walker.

My admiration for Dale only grew through working with him and getting to know him better and becoming friends over the years. I only wish I had gotten lucky earlier. Not because it may have helped me become something of a writer sooner, but because it would have been my good luck to know Dale longer and better, just because he was Dale.

Dale died December 8, 2015.

“Death” comes to life.

The Death of Delgado and Other Stories has come to life from Pen-L Publishing and is now available for your reading and browsing pleasure. This collection of short stories includes several published in a variety of anthologies over the years as well as some seeing print for the first time.

The title story won the Western Writers of America Spur Award for Best Western Short Fiction in 2012 and “A Border Affair” was a Finalist for that award in 2006. The stories range from traditional-type Westerns to those with a more historical bent to humor to mystery to flash fiction and some that don’t fit any category. All are set in the olden days of the American West save one modern-day story set at a rodeo and another that is a contemporary parody—or maybe satire.

Your best deal on the book will come directly from the publisher ( www.pen-l.com ) and it is available from online booksellers and by order from any bookstore.

Short stories are fun to write and enjoyable to read. In one sitting, you get a heaping helping of action, adventure, humor, or other tasty treat. I think you’ll like The Death of Delgado and Other Stories.

If not, let me know. If you do, tell everybody.

Happiness is Lubbock, Texas…

To paraphrase an old Mac Davis song, happiness is Lubbock, Texas, in my rearview mirror.

We’re just back from a visit there for the annual Western Writers of America convention. Leaving Lubbock was a happy occasion because when we left town I took with me a WWA Spur Award for my novel Rawhide Robinson Rides the Range and a Spur Finalist Award for my poem “Song of the Stampede” from my book Goodnight Goes Riding and Other Poems. 

Beyond that, it was enjoyable just being there.

There’s a lot of music in the air in Lubbock—besides Mac Davis, rock and roll pioneer Buddy Holly called the place home. Multi-talented Andy Wilkinson is from Lubbock, and he writes some of the best-ever songs and poems and plays about the American West and its people. He entertained WWA members with the able assistance of his Lubbock neighbor and saddle pal, singer-songwriter Andy Hedges.

Finally, it’s always enjoyable to attend the WWA convention to renew old friendships and make new ones. There is little in life as agreeable as hanging around with folks who love the West and words and writing and appreciate the difficulty of getting an idea down just right—say, for instance, capturing a young man’s quest for adventure with a line like, “I thought happiness was Lubbock, Texas, in my rearview mirror.”