Under the Wire

Oh, for the good old day

 


Oh, for the good old days of the cowboy. Back when the horse was King, there was no internet (or electricity for that matter) and saddling your horse was so much easier. The saddling procedure itself hasn’t changed much over the past one hundred fifty years. What to put on old Dobbin’s back? That’s another story.

Back in those good, old, golden years of the cowboy there wasn’t a lot of choice what he strapped onto his trusty steed. There were several saddle makers, but in a given region, their output was fairly similar. In fact, you could tell where a stranger came from by the style of “wood” he had under him. Boy, do I envy them.

Today, there must be hundreds of choices to make before you pull up the latigo. First, of course, choose your activity or event. That narrows your choice of saddles down to only a hundred or so. Note to non-horse using readers. No cowboy worth his Wranglers would be caught dead team roping in a cutting saddle. A serious western Pleasure exhibitor would rather streak naked across the show ring than ride in astraddle a calf roping rig. Compete in more than one activity? Better build a bigger tack room for all the saddles you’ll need.

If saddle selection isn’t hard enough, there’s more. Under the proper saddle must be the appropriate blanket or pad. Are there choices there? Don’t get me started. Incidentally, many pads cost more than the entire rig, horse included, the early cowboy made his living from.

Early man, I’m talking about before the creation of saddle catalogs, probably owned but one bridle and bit, also. Today? You’ve got to be kidding. I have twenty or more in my tack room and I own one and a half horses. I have one steed I’m not too proud of. He’s the half. Different bits make different horses do different things. I know that's a lot of “differents” but no other word describes the situation.

Yep, I long for the simpler days when the cowboy threw his covers off himself, made the coffee, then threw those same covers over his horse’s back. He then cinched up a saddle just like everyone rode, got on and went to work. His mind was then free to think about topics such as the weather, cows and what’s for dinner. That is, unless he was riding a half-wit like the one I mentioned earlier. Then he also had to think about how long a walk he had back to the ranch.

I’m telling you, it must have been great!

 

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