Country Editor's Boy: A Memoir

by Hal Borland

A memoir of youthful years spent in Colorado as the American West was transformed, by the author of High, Wide, and Lonesome and The Dog Who Came to Stay.  Country Editor’s Boy picks up where Hal Borland’s classic memoir High, Wide and Lonesome left with Borland, on the cusp of adulthood in the early twentieth century, making his way in an eastern Colorado town that still retained all the flavors of the Old West. Borland’s father, the editor of a local weekly newspaper, was working to help his publication transition along with the town around him. At the same time, young Hal was experiencing dramatic social and economic change in his own way. In a matter of a decade, Borland’s Colorado town shifted from a frontier outpost to part of a rapidly urbanizing new America. This memoir shows a boy entering adulthood as the world around him comes of age. Evocative and wholly engrossing, Country Editor’s Boy is a vividly drawn portrait of western life, by one of the greatest naturalist writers of his age.

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir, History, Biography

323 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1970

About the author

Harold Glen Borland was a nature journalist. During World War II he wrote radio programs for the government and served as special magazine correspondent. He had written several documentary movies, two volumes of poetry, a volume of essays, has collaborated on a play, and has contributed many non-fiction articles, short stories and novelettes to leading magazines here and abroad.

Mr. Borland was graduated from the Columbia School of Journalism. He also attended the University of Colorado and received a Litt.D. from there in 1944.

Reviews

[Pauline · Rating 3 out of 5]

We read aloud this coming-of-age book very slowly—while we were on two different road trips to CO and some Western states. It was the perfect backdrop. It is an interesting continuation of Hal Borland’s life story and we loved his first book “High, Wide, and Lonesome.” Toward the end, we felt like we were plodding through the story. Where most was a captivating view of life in CO in the early to mid 1900’s the latter half felt too detailed (almost as if he was trying to push up word count.) at about 90% (this was ebook) we abandoned the story. It didn’t feel as fascinating and absorbing when we weren’t on the road. We will probably go back and finish it off on our next road trip.

[Karl Holappa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Firstly, I wish I had read Borland’s High, Wide, and Lonesome before reading this just to put his life in chronological context. Regardless, I picked this up at a local goodwill and I was attracted to it due to my background in the newspaper industry. I’m glad I purchased it.

Borland had a knack for being able to create an image of his adolescent years that would all make us readers envious of his ability to recall such memories. I was thoroughly impressed at the vividness he put into his writing.

This book would be of interest for those who have a passion for the culture of the mountain west states, as it provides a glimpse into what early development looked like as technology dawned. We’re not talking Wild West imagery here. We’re talking about citizens trying to create cities from scattered groups of homesteaders who stuck around combined with new transplants like Borland and his family.

Many of these cities and towns had their majority of their growth during the time Borland writes about, and many of them have had no significant growth or development since. It is fascinating to read about the idealism and passion these citizens had for their futures.

Probably the best part of Borland’s writing is his passion for the natural world that surrounds us. He writes in great detail of the flora and fauna of the area he grew up in, and it is no surprise to learn he became an outdoor columnist later on in life.

Reading this book was like taking a Time Machine to the past, and I see the emotion he writes about every time I visit a small rural town and think about how it came to existence.

[Jb Frost · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good auto-biography with clear picture of the changing times of our nation. If you start with this one it does make you want to read the earlier one as well.
Borland writes of the time of the western lands after the early days of settlement but still before the days of modern conveniences and comforts. It is a story of a boy growing up and learning how to deal with life as he faces both good and bad times.

[Deeann · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating history of the Colorado prairie in the early 1900's. The author is a naturalist and his descriptions of the flora and fauna are really beautiful.

[Sandy Carmichael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoroughly enjoyed with coming of age book of yesteryear.

[Beverly Hollandbeck · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sequel to High, Wide, and Lonesome, about growing up on the Colorado plains. Charming story charmingly told.

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

wonderful read

I am sorry to have read the last page. What is next for Hal? I think his other memoirs are from years later in his life.

[Sgt Rick · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is really annoying! Good Reads has been doing this for a year or more/ I buy a book ... in thia case "Country Boy". Before I even read two chapters, Good Reads tells me I finished the book. WELL, I HAVE NOT YET FINISHED IT. I WILL TELL YOU WHEN I AM DONE!!

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

What struck me most in “Country Editor’s Boy” was how much this memoir read like fiction, in style. Because Hal Borland was a writer by profession, he might have had a tendency to notice and remember more than his peers – or, he could have done supplementary research to tell his own story, told somewhat removed, as if another person. Because it's not fiction, it's not quite as interesting, but has the elements of any coming-of-age story. Most notably owing to the dialogue, it doesn't feel like the distant past, but breathes as if you stepped back in time and got to see firsthand how things were in Flagler, Colorado, just about 100 years ago. Written when he was an adult, he'd had the time to see the perspective he may have lacked as a youngster.

One of my favorite passages was when he described going from being the “printer’s devil” covered in ink from cleaning the shop and tools, to an apprentice, where he describes the whole printing process, as he learned it. With hand lettering, he points out where the terms “upper” and “lower case” come from. The logotypes, however, are not as not as easy to appreciate: the combination of the letter “f” with “l” or “i” doesn’t seem like it would need its own block, but if you had to pick out every letter every time, I suppose you would find where shortcuts could come in handy.

Young Borland kept quite busy. He tried to get a baseball and then a football team together, football being one constant through his high school career. Every odd job where someone was needed, they’d go into the newspaper office and get the boy and his father to agree for him to do the job. Nature writing wasn’t even on his radar at the time, but he remembered enough to include some nice passages about the plains. He and his friends Little Doc and Spider, real names Justin and Stanley, saw one time some “shitepokes” – what they called herons and other associated birds, perhaps because they poke around in the shite. They went out and about all the time, but sadly, illnesses could turn deadly back then – there wasn’t as much that could be done when someone got sick.

Still, he characterized the people in those towns as having “pioneer doggedness and frontier optimism,” and there were “old-timers” and all the other characters of a small, western town. To describe his parents in one word based on what they say and how they act, I’d say his mother was shrewd and his father was jovial, but also kind, generous, optimistic. His mother was practical and fair, and strict about rules. How much of that was inherent, how much was just worry about her only child growing up? This memoir, while saturated with detail, is never long-winded. It is very well written, and each chapter, linking nicely to the next, surrounds some aspect of growing up, his experience within the changing times.

Note: this e-book was provided through Net Galley. For more reviews, follow my blog at http://matt-stats.blogspot.com/

[Bill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eastern Colorado circa 1914-1918 and the frontier is changing, the buffalo are gone, slaughtered by white hunters, and the farmers have replaced most of the cattle ranches in that flat and fertile part of the state.

You’re a kid – in 7th, then 8th and finally high school – a new one, with 13 kids in your class – and you’re learning about life, about girls, and nature – the birds, animals, insects, and plants that surround you there in what might have been still wild country.

You get your first jobs – learning printing with your dad at his newspaper; hand cranking a movie projector Saturday for the first
‘movie theatre’ showing all silent films; taking jobs here and there and learning about hard work and how you need to know how much you’ll make before you begin a job.

And then you’re off – to spend a summer working for the famous Chautauqua entertainment people and soon off to college – but those years in your small town never leave you and become a part of your
intriguing nature writing in the years to come.

Absorbing, entertaining, and heart warming, many of you will empathize with and find yourself as Hal Borland writes of his growing up years in a small Western town changing with the changing times.

[Olive Richter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Brings back fond memories of growing up on the plains of Colorado

He paints a very accurate picture of the plains of Colorado including stories about animals, plants, the work ethic of the people, and politics of the day. It is a lovely depiction of the innocence of childhood and the quiet, steady guidance of loving parents as the boy grows into manhood.

[Greg Vandermeulen · Rating 5 out of 5]

So much nostalgia for a time I was never a part of. As a newspaper editor and one of the "ink-stained wretches" my entire life, this book was special. The tale of the country editor's boy growing up in a frontier town in the early 1900s was one I simply couldn't put down. This book goes back on my shelves as in another decade or so, I'll definitely want to read it again.

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

I like Hal Borland, ever since I was a kid and read "When the Legends Die."