Portraits of Reality

The old saying: “one picture is worth 1000 words” would directly apply to the showcase of work by Erwin E. Smith.  Smith’s camera caught in pictures a reality that was in direct opposition to the stereotype afforded by Hollywood of the life lead by the Western cowboy in the 1800s.   This particular photograph of a cowboy injured on the ground was especially moving.  Seldom did Hollywood show the real physical or emotional impacts of the cowboy lifestyle.


Although cowboys would show up with white, perfect teeth, ruggedly handsome faces, dusty, but un-tattered clothing and a perfect physique with no missing limbs or digits on the Hollywood set, the actual reality of the physical health of a cowboy was quite different.  As Smith’s picture depicts, the environment played a huge role in the health of a cowboy.  In a stark desert or on boggy ground surrounded by cliffs the cowboy was constantly at odds with his physical surroundings.  Being thrown from a horse while negotiating a steep hillside or drowning while fording a river were always possibilities.  Romantic starry nights were rarely the case in an environment where temperatures could vary by 60 degrees or more.  Tornadoes, snowstorms, hail, thunderstorms, flooding rains and the burning rays of the sun without adequate protection were also causes for a shortened lifespan.


The actual physical costs of being a cowboy were enormous.  In 1875 a Wyoming newspaper described them as “rough men with shaggy hair and wild staring eyes in butternut trousers stuffed into great rough boots”, cowboys were seen as the epitome of toughness.  Under those trousers was a body that was abused.  Moving from town to town these men were subject to contact with disease, the most feared being cholera.  Lack of education, proper nutrition and clean water made them even more vulnerable to their lifestyle. 

Medical care was scarce for the cowboy.  Injuries were left to heal awkwardly or led to amputation or death.  One famous gunfighter, Doc Holliday, was an actual doctor of dental surgery and had a practice in Dodge City in 1878.  Obviously, dentistry was just not exciting enough for this man.  Medicine came in the form of a whiskey bottle or a “patent” medicine that had extremely high alcohol content.  Tobacco was ever present and either chewed or smoked.  Many cowboys called tobacco plugs “brain tablets” because it gave them “time to think.”  Health consequences of smoking, also romanticized by the movie and marketing industries are now public knowledge.


Browsing through the many photographs by Erwin E. Smith, another evident difficulty of being a cowboy was emotional stress and the toll it took on their well-being.  Loneliness was the topic of many cowboy ballads, but the movies once again glorified an extremely unhealthy condition.  Loneliness can be depressing and cause extreme anxiety.  Other mental health issues included constantly living in a state of fear.  Fear caused by the unknown.  Indian attacks, gunshots wounds (“death settles all disputes”), cattle stampedes and even fear of coming upon a vigilante group, out for revenge on the first person they find, were all contributors to the actual mental health of a cowboy.   The faces of the men in Smith’s photographs show that stress of everyday life.


 “Anybody with guts and a horse” could be a cowboy.  Those that signed up were generally in their late teens, early twenties and single.  Those who lived past the age of 35 were extremely lucky.


“Yup.  The end of a way of life.  Too bad.  It’s a good way.  Wagons forward! Yo!”  Easy for John Wayne to say, he got to go home to a warm bed every night.  


Image source <http://www.cartermuseum.org/collections/smith/images/details/LC-S59-223.jpg>