A Vaquero Of The Brush Country

by J. Frank Dobie, Justin C. Gruelle (Illustrator)

1929. Partly from the reminiscences of John Young. The Making of a Vaquero; The Mossy Horns; For Their Hides and Tallow; The Razorbacks; The Bloody Border; If Not Law-Then Order; Up the Chisholm Trail; Bringing in the Strays; Dodging Comanches and Hunting Water; Establishing a Ranch on the Plains; From Hell to Breakfast; Billy the Kid Interpreted; Many Trails; When the Brush Popped; Brush Country; The Big Steal and the Breakup; The Brasaderos; Mustangs; The Bandana and Other Belongings; The Man With the Iron Hand; and Trans-Pecos. See other titles by this author available from Kessinger Publishing.

Genres: Biography, Nonfiction, Folklore, Westerns, American History, History

320 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 1943

About the author

Called the "Storyteller of the Southwest," James Frank Dobie was born in 1888 on his family's cattle ranch in Live Oak County. During his long life, J. Frank Dobie would live astride two worlds: a rugged life on a Texas cattle ranch and the state's modern centers of scholarly learning.

Dobie came to Austin in 1914 to teach at the University of Texas. In time he pioneered an influential course on the literature of the Southwest. By the late 1920s, Dobie discovered his mission: to record and publicize the disappearing folklore of Texas and the greater Southwest. Dobie became secretary of the Texas Folklore Society, a position he held for 21 years.

J. Frank Dobie Dobie was a new kind of folklorist—a progressive activist. He called for UT to admit African-American students in the 1940s—long before the administration favored integration. Dobie's vocal politics led to his leaving the University in 1947, but he continued writing until his death in 1964, publishing over twenty books and countless articles.

The inscription on Dobie's headstone in the Texas State Cemetery reads: "I have come to value liberated minds as the supreme good of life on earth." J. Frank Dobie was not content to simply preserve Southwestern heritage within libraries and museums. He gave life to that heritage and informed generations of Texans about their rich history.

Reviews

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

In addition to collecting folklore, Dobie also gathered oral history. A Vaquero of the Brush Country is John Young's account of life as a South Texas cowboy from the 1870s to the early 20th century. The book covers a lot of ground from daily life, to the cattle business as a business, the cattle business as a way of life, and a fair bit about plain old Texas violence. Young tells a lot about the hide & tallow business on the Texas coast. There is interesting material about Shanghai Pierce, the King & Kenedy ranches as well.


Dobie often interpolates his own account of Texas history, filling in details that Young didn't know or didn't comment on. This is the only book that gives an inside view of the "Skinning War" in S. Texas. Young also pioneered in West Texas. A Vaquero of the Brush Country is invaluable if you want to get an idea of what life was like on the S. Texas in the heyday of the cattle trade.

[Geoff Sebesta · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very good book. It's the best book about the 19th century range that I've ever read. Nearly every page was fascinating. Dobie is a natural storyteller.

It is also a very, very racist book.

It's so racist that it's an interesting expression of white privilege to be able to read it. Because if you're personally threatened or hurt by racist humor, then this book will make you too angry to be able to read it. I think Dobie was probably about averagely racist for his time and place, though that's pretty racist. He doesn't descend into weird theories or dim allegories, he just tells lots of racist jokes. And then you get to the part about the cook who said he was a horse, and it's so disturbing that it's probably true.

It's fascinating, honest, a true depiction of what a lot of white people believed during his time in Texas. But it's objectively offensive.

[Fredrick Danysh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dobie writes in his folksy manner of life in the brush country in South Texas. These are stories of cowboys around the beginning of the twentieth century.

[Jim Angstadt · Rating 1 out of 5]

Just could not get interested in this. Bailed early.