Cowboy and Western Songs

Hardcover sienna brown cloth boards with gold blind stamp to the spine are protected by a decorative, unclipped, dustjacket that is in only acceptable with edge curl to the top, bottom, front and rear, small chips and an approximate 6" tear to the back that has been poorly taped. The spine and boards are in good condition with wear to the top and bottom of the back strip and on the lower board. Corners all show wear with some bumping. The binding is straight and tight, hinges are firmly attached with no cracking to the end pagers. Text block is solid with all pages firmly attached with a few spots along the top edge but with no impact to interior pages. Interior pages are clean with no tears, no chips, or previous owner marks. This present book draws on more than three decades of song hunting, and a cross-referenced collection of ballads gathered from oral tradition, resources of other field collectors, periodicals, esoteric publications, and frontier newspapers.

Austin Edwin Fife (1909 – 1986) and Alta Stevens Fife (1912 – 1996) as a married couple began folklore research together in the late 1930's when they were living in California where Austin was a graduate student at Stanford University. Returning to Utah in 1960 where they met at Utah State University the couple dedicated much of their time for collecting and preserving the cultural expressions of the American West and Mormon folklore. The Fifes' work has influenced generations of folklorist and the lives of countless Utahns, who have enjoyed a richer cultural experience because of their work.

James Kenneth "J.K." Ralston (1896 – 1987) was an American painter whose primary topics were the American West and images of cowboys and American Indians. Hailing from eastern Montana, in 1917 he "rode a cattle train to Chicago" where he attended the Chicago Art Institute. He only attended for three months before enlisting in the US Army in 1918 during World War I. After the war he returned to the Chicago Art Institute in the fall of 1920 and in 1935 after the Great Depression he opened a studio in Billings, Montana working as a professional full-time artist.