True Tales of the American Southwest: Pioneer Recollections of Frontier Adventures Book

Howard Bryan's latest book offers a treasury of stories, anecdotes, and personal histories published here for the first time. Drawn from his personal archives, Bryan's book is based on the recollections of pioneering "old-timers" who lived in the Southwest in the 1800s and early decades of this century as the frontier era was drawing to a close. In extended informal interviews during the 1950s, Bryan collected the material from old-timers who lived through the events and whose stories typified the determination, humor, and courage of men and women surviving in dangerous and violent times.

About the Author:

Howard Bryan is a popular western historian who originally came to prominence working as an Albuquerque reporter and columnist from 1948 to 1990. He received the prestigious Western Writers of America SPUR Award, the New Mexico Governor's Award for Excellence in Literature, and other awards for his writing on the early West. He has made frequent appearances on network television documentaries and he is the author of three acclaimed books on the Southwest: "Incredible Elfego Baca," "Wildest of the Wild West," and "Robbers, Rogues, and Ruffians." Bryan is a long-time Albuquerque resident.

Wild West Magazine

In 1955, 100-year-old Vicente Otero told Howard Bryan: "I knew Billy the Kid and I saw him dead at Fort Sumner. I was there when he was killed.... Billy was just a little fellow who didn't look dangerous at all. They say he killed quite a few people, but he always was very nice to me."...Bryan had the good fortune in the 1950s to interview Otero...and many other pioneering old-timers. Those interviews, drawn from Bryan's personal archives, provide a wealth of true stories and anecdotes.