Tom Russell, one of the great American singer-songwriters, done wrote a book. Against The Blood. “A few words on the saga: Welcome to 1953. A Pima Indian and a young cowboy songwriter are driving across the Great Western Deserts on an odyssey to pick up a load of saddles… discussing Western history in a dying film era when there were 100,00 … [Read more...] about ‘Bad Trouble Ensues’

The other day, I stumbled across a post on Facebook that sent me right back to my youth, sitting on the edge of my bed in a tiny bedroom in La Crescenta, California, completely absorbed in the words and pictures of Edwin Tunis. For several years running when I was probably 10-12 years old, I got for my birthday or Christmas a volume of Tunis’s … [Read more...] about Frontier Living

There is no more fundamental frontier tool than the axe. From the Atlantic Seaboard to the Mississippi River and from the Rockies to the Pacific Shore, this was the implement that shaped America. A professional woodsman has written a loving tribute to this fine tool, and it’s going to have to find a place on the Frontier Partisan Bookshelf. Are you … [Read more...] about American Axe

It’s a good thing I enjoy the company of Daniel Boone. He keeps showing up in my path. The esteemed Ted Franklin Belue’s new one is out: Finding Daniel Boone is a unique tribute to America's frontier hero and offers closure to the greatest of all his mysteries: where he was buried. Part biography, part historical travelogue and eloquently … [Read more...] about Boone’s Bones

An Irish folksinger from Portland named Peter Yeates headlined the very first Sisters Folk Festival in 1995. He came back for the ’98 Festival. He was a character. I was a drinking man back then, and we had us some fun at the ’98 afterparty, tipping back pints, banging on guitars and singing boozy, bawdy songs. One of my favorite moments … [Read more...] about Wild Colonial Boys

“The die was cast so deeply in blood that none of them would be forgiven by their memories.” — Jim Harrison, Revenge   * Woke up thinking about Revenge. Not a personal quest for vengeance, at least at this moment. I’m talking about the novella by the late, great Jim Harrison and the 1990 movie that Tony Scott made from it, starring … [Read more...] about Looking For ‘Revenge’

It seems that every generation must have its own take on Daniel Boone, both as a man and and as a symbol of the American thrust into the trans-Appalachian wilderness. We’re about to get another one... Boone: An Unfinished Portrait by Daniel Firth Griffith. Who was Daniel Boone? Was he a woodsman-philosopher or American Patriot? In this … [Read more...] about ‘Boone: An Unfinished Portrait’

Ordinarily, I would plow through a 272-page borderland thriller from James Carlos Blake in handful of days. Maybe two. I haven’t done that with The Bones of Wolfe. The demands of work — newspaper and Frontier Partisans — have forced me to slow it down and read in small chunks. Not necessarily the best way to let the momentum of Story sweep you … [Read more...] about The Big, Bad Wolfes Are At The Door

By Rick Schwertfeger, Captain, Frontier Partisans Southern Command I must be crazy. I’m writing about Ernest Hemingway, one of the most studied, well-known, complex, deeply flawed, and yet extraordinary Americans. And many Frontier Partisans may know much more about the man than I do. But, we’ll see that author Chris Warren found more to … [Read more...] about Hemingway In The Yellowstone High Country

I wasn’t going to weigh in at all on the Washington, DC NFL team’s decision to drop the “Redskins” moniker after years of pressure. The matter is in my territory — the popular culture’s ever-evolving relationship with frontier history — but I just can’t get worked up about it. I know Indians who hate it and Indians who could give a shit about it. … [Read more...] about Redskins, Rangers And Revisionism