Reviews for Cowboy The Illustrated History

The average rating for Cowboy The Illustrated History based on 2 reviews is 5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2012-04-25 00:00:00 Christophe Ravier In the crowd of books about cowboys, this one stands out chiefly for the well-researched photography. Here you will see classic photos from the late 19th century ranging right up to the present. Among the older photos it's refreshing to find many that have rarely, if ever, been published before. Especially useful is the careful identification of each one, with the place, date, and name of the photographer. While some of them have circulated anonymously on the Internet for years, it's illuminating to have their subjects identified (especially the studio group-shot of XIT cowboys that you sometimes see hand tinted, on pp. 142-143). I also had not known that the wonderful bunkhouse shot of a cowboy with a guitar (pp. 154-155) is cowboy-song collector and poet Jack Rhodes. Richard Slatta's history of the cowboy supports the photo images well but breaks no new ground on his subject. Readers of other cowboy books will find the usual topics, from cowboy gear to trail drives and rodeos, and a repetition of what's generally known already (though for someone who's never researched the material, it's an excellent introduction). If there's an unusual angle, it's that Slatta goes out of his way to comment on the role of women in ranch culture. Altogether, this makes a fine gift book. It is handsomely designed, on nicely finished paper, and the photos are reproduced with satisfying clarity. The book includes recommendations for further reading and a listing of museums and events with their Internet addresses.

Review # 2 was written on 2013-02-12 00:00:00 Jacob Thiem This is a classic book in the esoteric tradition by one of the great esotericists of the 19th century. Schure was an early influence on Rudolf Steiner, who met and spoke with him just prior to making the decision to accept the leadership of the German Theosophical Society in 1904. The book thus has great value as a historical document. As a factually accurate account of the lives of the "great initiates," it has less value. It is filled with inaccuracies, only one of which I will point out here. Schure describes the Great Pyramid of Giza as an initiation temple and describes, in detail, how initiation rituals were conducted there. His accounts are at odds with the physical structure of the pyramid as revealed by contemporary archaeology and, speaking from personal experience as one who has visited the Great Pyramid and walked inside, I find very little in his account that is plausible. It may be that his account, written in 1889, could have been taken seriously by his contemporaries, but archaeological work since that time has demonstrated its many shortcomings. Read this as a historical document with great importance for the history of Western esotericism, but not as a factual work.