A. Farnum

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Pawnee bills historic wild west - photo documentary of the 1901-05 show tou

Occasionally, some notably historic piece of Americana--artifacts, photographs, or written materia--turns up from forgotten storage. Such is the case with the 155 pristine negatives printed in Pawnee Bill's Historic Wild West. They were taken while the show was on tour between 1900 and 1905 by cowboy/amateur photographer Harry Bock. This is truly a photo documentary without parallel and offers western, historical, and tent show buffs a visual look back in time with exceptional detail and clarity. These images of the hand-carved wagons, tents, midway crowds, Indians, cowboys, cowgirls, equipment, and buffalo are accompanied by the carefully researched story of the adventure-filled life of Major Gordon W. Lillie/Pawnee Bill--buffalo hunter, plains scout, White Chief of the Pawnees, Wild West showman, land boomer, oilman, banker, conservationist. The photographer, "Buckskin Harry" Bock, another frontier pioneer and cowboy/carpenter, worked many years for Pawnee Bill until becoming a Baptist missionary to the Pawnee Indians. Together their lives provide a fascinating background to accompany this visual close-up look at a period in life that is gone forever--the Wild West show of the early 1900s--the forerunner of our modern rodeo. Pawnee Bill's Historic Wild West belongs in all museum and collectors' libraries.