The True Life of a Cowboy

Hollywood often leads us to believe that cowboys were "Violent  gunslingers" or nomadic people who were somewhat of outlaws. When people think of cowboys they often think of the likes of Clint Eastwood or Jesse James. However these portrayals of cowboys are far from the trust. In reality, the lives of cowboys were hard. Though perhaps some truths can be found in the Hollywood portrayals, the majority of cowboy life was spent on cattle drives, and working for a living.


The definition of cowboy is one who herds cattle. This definititon alone goes against many of the stereotypes often given to cowboys. The word cowboy has grown to carry many negative connotations, such as being reckless, and wild. However these connotations are far off from the realities of cowboy life.


The true life of a cowboy was a lonely and a dangerous one. Cowboys spent most of there time on the "road" so to speak. They went on long cattle drives in order to round up cattle and bring it to ranches in order to be sold and butchered for meat. Along with that they would often have to go on roundups in order to find or in some cases save the cattle from dangerous places and situations.

Hollywood goes about portraying cowboys a much different way. Many movies have been made in which cowboys are made out to be "rough riders" and "violent" types of people. Movies such as The Good the Bad and the Ugly, and Wild West show cowboys as people totally different than who they actually were. Hollywood misses the point that cowboys lives were much more than shoot outs at high noon, and drinking and playing cards in the saloon. Cowboys lives were on the road, rounding up cattle, and fighting to survive the dangerous conditions.


Though many western movies are seen today as the best of all time. It is evident that they are not historically true. Hollywood added their own spin to the lives of cowboys, in order to add excitement and drama; however in reality that is what most of their lives were. After all, it is not easy living in a town with all men, no women to help out. This was probably a pretty exciting time, however not for the reasons Hollywood was looking for.

Photo Source: http://www.cartermuseum.org/collections/smith/collection.php