The Mother Hubbard Saddle

The Mother Hubbard Saddle: A Piece of Western History

The last time I photographed saddle maker Doug Cox at his shop in Nevada, he was already thinking about the next challenge he wanted to create for himself.

At 75, after more than 900 saddles and five decades working with leather, Doug doesn't exactly need another challenge. But he had decided to build a Mother Hubbard, an early style of Western saddle rarely made today.

When I asked him why, his answer was simple.

“Just because.”

That answer makes more sense once you understand what a Mother Hubbard saddle actually is.

The finished Mother Hubbard shows the broad leather coverage that distinguishes the early saddle design, with floral tooling covering much of its surface.

What Is a Mother Hubbard Saddle?

The Mother Hubbard comes from an early period in the development of the American Western saddle, before the familiar cowboy saddle evolved into the form most people recognize today.

Its most obvious characteristic is the amount of leather surrounding the saddle tree. One single large piece of leather extends down, creating a distinctive covered appearance and silhouette. It's immediately different from a modern Western saddle, where the individual components and shape of the tree are much more apparent.

Mother Hubbards emerged during the 19th century and became associated with the developing saddle-making traditions of the American West. Their unusual name is generally connected to the loose, full-coverage “Mother Hubbard” dresses of the period, an appropriate description for a saddle whose leather seems to drape around and cover much of its structure.

But what makes the saddle interesting isn't simply its age or appearance.

It's the way it's built.

Cutting patterns from a large piece of leather, Doug works at the center of his saddle-making bench.

Before the tooling and finishing, a broad piece of leather is fitted over the saddle tree in Doug Cox's workshop.

Why a Mother Hubbard Is So Difficult to Make

Modern saddle makers benefit from generations of refinement. Over time, Western saddles evolved as makers learned what worked for horses, riders, ranch work, construction, and repair.

Building an earlier design means stepping backward into a very different way of solving those problems.

The single broad piece of leather that give the Mother Hubbard its characteristic appearance also make fitting and shaping the saddle particularly demanding. Leather has to conform around compound curves and transition cleanly across the saddle without looking forced or poorly fitted. Small mistakes become increasingly difficult to hide as the work progresses.

It requires a combination of leather working ability, an understanding of saddle construction, and the patience to figure out techniques that few working saddle makers dare to conquer anymore.

Doug described building one as “absolutely hellacious.”

Coming from someone who has made more than 900 saddles, that carries some weight.

And that's precisely why he wanted to do it.

Working by hand, Doug stitches a curved section of leather as he builds the Mother Hubbard saddle.

Doug Cox Builds a Mother Hubbard

The first time Doug told me about the project, the saddle didn't exist yet.

It came up toward the end of a larger story I'd been photographing about him and his career. Doug has spent more than five decades building saddles, repairing them, studying historic examples, and developing his own ideas about what makes a saddle work.

That larger story became Western Saddle Maker, my original piece about Doug, his Nevada shop, and a career spent learning a craft that can't really be mastered quickly.

The Mother Hubbard was different.

There wasn't an order to fill or a customer waiting for a working ranch saddle. This was about curiosity and scratching an itch.

After a lifetime spent building saddles, Doug was going backward to understand one.

That's something I've always found interesting about people who become exceptionally good at a craft. Experience doesn't necessarily make them less curious. Sometimes it gives them the confidence to tackle things that make absolutely no economic sense.

The Mother Hubbard was one of those things.

Leatherworking tools fill the wooden drawer beneath the bench as Doug reaches for one of them.

Pattern pieces and measurements cover the workbench as Doug works out the construction of the Mother Hubbard.

An Old Saddle Built Again

By the time I returned, the pieces I'd previously heard Doug talking about had become a finished saddle.

Seeing it completed makes the oddity of the design much easier to understand.

It doesn't look quite like the Western saddle most of us carry around in our heads. The proportions are different. The mass of leather changes the silhouette. Details that might disappear on a contemporary saddle become part of the visual identity of the Mother Hubbard.

And yet it isn't simply a museum reproduction.

It was made by a man who understands saddles from the perspective of someone who has spent his life building them to be used.

That's an important distinction.

There is a difference between making something look old and understanding why an old object was made the way it was. Doug has spent decades studying saddle construction, taking saddles apart, repairing them, riding them, building them, and learning from the craftsmen who came before him.

The Mother Hubbard gave him an opportunity to apply all of that knowledge to a form from another era.

Flowers, leaves and carved lines fill the leather along the skirt of the finished saddle.

Photographing the Mother Hubbard

That's also what interested me about photographing it.

My ongoing work in the West has never been solely about cowboys or cattle. The culture is also defined by people who make the objects that allow it to function: saddles, boots, hats, bits, spurs, silverwork, ropes, and countless other things that are easy to overlook until you meet someone who has devoted a lifetime to making them.

A finished saddle can be beautiful.

But the real story is the knowledge inside it.

The cuts and stitches are visible. The decades required to know where those cuts and stitches belong are not.

That's what makes someone like Doug worth documenting.

And it's what makes this particular saddle more interesting than simply being an unusual antique design.

Someone still knows how to make one.

Polished metal stirrup hangs below the tooled leather and buckled strap of the Mother Hubbard saddle.

The Mother Hubbard in Cowboys & Indians

The finished Mother Hubbard and my photographs of Doug were recently featured in Cowboys & Indians magazine.

For me, the significance of the story goes beyond having the photographs published.

The Mother Hubbard represents something that's becoming increasingly difficult to find: knowledge passed down through people rather than preserved only in books, museums, or old objects.

Historic saddles can tell us a great deal about the American West. But there is something different about watching a living craftsman study one, understand it, wrestle with its problems, and then make another with his own hands.

Doug didn't need to build a Mother Hubbard.

There probably aren't many people who do.

Which brings the story back to the question I asked him before he'd made it.

Why go through all that trouble?

“Just because.”

After seeing the finished saddle, that still seems like the best answer.

More From the American West

My earlier story, Western Saddle Maker, goes deeper into Doug Cox's life, his Nevada shop, and more than five decades spent building saddles.

This work is part of Calves to the Fire, my ongoing photographic documentation of working cowboys, ranches, craftsmen, artists, and traditions throughout the American West.

Below the cantle, a Doug Cox maker's badge is set into the carved leather above a braided section.

CrossFit Photography - Boulder, CO

CrossFit Photography in Boulder, Colorado

CrossFit is unusually good territory for photography because very little needs to be manufactured. The movement, effort, repetition, exhaustion, chalk, equipment, and interaction between athletes already create the visual language.

The challenge is staying out of the way long enough for those moments to happen.

These photographs were made during CrossFit training in Boulder, Colorado, with an approach that has shaped much of my fitness work since: photograph athletes actually training rather than repeatedly stopping workouts to manufacture photographs.

Two athletes hang from the pull-up rig doing toes-to-bar during a CrossFit training session in Boulder.

Photographing the Training, Not Recreating It

There is a noticeable difference between someone performing an exercise for a camera and someone actually training.

Body language changes. Expressions change. Fatigue accumulates. The gym gets messy. Athletes stop thinking about the photographer.

That's usually when the interesting photographs start happening.

Rather than making every frame about a perfectly executed movement, I'm also looking for everything surrounding it: hands preparing for a lift, athletes recovering between efforts, chalk in the air, interaction between training partners, equipment scattered across the floor, and the moments immediately before and after the work.

Those details give a fitness campaign a sense of place and make the resulting library feel less like a collection of exercise demonstrations.

Barbells move overhead as athletes work through a training session inside the gym.

Chalk still covers his hands as an athlete smiles between efforts with other training continuing behind him.

CrossFit Photography for Brands and Advertising

For fitness brands, the advantage of photographing real training is authenticity without giving up production value.

A commercial shoot still needs intention. Lighting, composition, wardrobe, products, locations, shot lists, and usage all matter. But those elements don't necessarily require making the athlete look staged.

My approach is to build the production around the activity whenever possible, then give athletes enough room to move naturally within it.

That can create a much broader image library from a single production: hero images for advertising, wider environmental photographs, product details, portraits, training sequences, and quieter transitional moments for social, editorial, web, and campaign use.

Between sets, the two athletes pause together before continuing the workout.

An athlete screams after a failed attempt as sunlight streams across the gym floor.

The Visual Language of Functional Fitness

Functional fitness has its own visual vocabulary.

Barbells, kettlebells, rowing machines, bikes, pull-up rigs, boxes, ropes, plates, chalk, rubber floors, and worn equipment immediately establish the environment. But equipment alone doesn't make a photograph feel believable.

The athlete does.

Effort has to look like effort.

That's why I prefer working with real athletes whenever a project allows for it. Their familiarity with the movements means less directing, better body positioning, and more freedom to concentrate on making photographs rather than teaching someone how an exercise is supposed to look.

An athlete pauses beside a loaded barbell as sunlight cuts across the gym floor.

Preparing a loaded barbell on the gym floor, an athlete prepares for the next set.

Fitness Photography in Boulder and Beyond

Boulder has a strong connection to training, endurance, and outdoor athletics, which makes it a natural location for fitness productions. It also offers something particularly useful for commercial shoots: the ability to combine indoor training with Colorado's outdoor environments.

A project can move from strength and functional training inside a gym to running, cycling, hiking, or other active lifestyle imagery outside, creating a larger visual campaign without losing continuity.

While this shoot was made in Boulder, I photograph fitness and active lifestyle campaigns throughout Colorado and travel nationally for commercial and editorial assignments.

Three athletes work through handstands across the training floor, their shadows stretching through the gym.

A loaded barbell moves overhead as an athlete works through a strength movement among the equipment on the gym floor.

Commercial CrossFit and Fitness Photographer

I work with advertising agencies, fitness brands, apparel and equipment companies, gyms, and athletes to create photography that feels athletic without feeling manufactured.

The goal isn't to make training look perfect.

It's to make it look believable.

For commercial photography projects involving CrossFit, strength training, functional fitness, athletes, or active lifestyle imagery, view my fitness portfolio or get in touch to discuss the production.

Most of my my fitness photography is also available for editorial and commercial licensing.

Jump ropes turn between efforts as two athletes continue training against the wood walls of the gym.

Between efforts, athletes reset around loaded barbells before getting back to the work.

Dark Fitness Photography

Dark Fitness Photography: Creating Dramatic Images for Athletic Brands

Dark fitness photography isn't simply about making a photograph dark.

Done well, it's about using light selectively. Instead of illuminating everything in a gym, the light can isolate an athlete, define muscle and movement, bring texture out of the environment, and let everything unnecessary disappear.

It's an approach I've used for years photographing athletes and fitness campaigns, particularly when a brand needs imagery that feels strong, focused, and intense.

A heavily loaded barbell rests across the athlete’s shoulders as he braces between wooden plyometric boxes.

What Makes Dark Fitness Photography Work?

Gyms are visually complicated places.

There are mirrors, machines, signs, windows, equipment, fluorescent lights, people, and dozens of other elements competing for attention. Lighting everything can sometimes make the photograph more confusing.

Darkness can simplify it.

By controlling where light falls, the athlete becomes the obvious focus while the environment provides context without taking over the photograph.

The result can feel much more intentional than simply photographing whatever ambient light happens to exist inside the gym.

A loaded barbell rests across the athlete’s shoulders as he prepares for the next part of the lift.

Sunlight cuts across the gym floor as the athlete stands beside a heavily loaded barbell.

Using Light to Photograph Strength and Movement

For this kind of fitness photography, I frequently use strobes to create shape rather than simply adding more light.

Where the light comes from matters.

Side and back lighting can define an athlete's body, separate them from a dark background, emphasize sweat and texture, and give movement more dimension. Areas of the frame that don't contribute to the photograph can fall naturally into shadow.

The objective isn't necessarily to make someone look more dramatic than they really are. It's to use light to communicate the intensity that's already there.

That becomes particularly effective with strength training, explosive movement, and exercises where body position and muscular definition are important parts of the photograph.

Framed by hanging rings, an athlete rests between sets inside the gym.

Four athletes work through heavy barbell deadlifts as sunlight stretches across the gym floor.

Why Dark Fitness Photography Works for Advertising

A fitness campaign needs more than a collection of impressive individual photographs. The images have to work together.

A darker visual approach can create consistency across different athletes, locations, exercises, and products. It can also give designers room to work with typography, logos, headlines, and other campaign elements.

That matters when photographs need to function across advertising, websites, social campaigns, retail displays, packaging, and other brand applications.

The goal is to create photographs that work as photographs while also understanding that they're part of a larger visual system.

Driving upward from a wide stance, the athlete holds a heavily loaded barbell across his shoulders.

Working from a deep squat, the athlete drives upward with a heavily loaded barbell as another athlete prepares behind him.

Real Athletes Still Matter

Lighting can change the mood of a photograph. It can't manufacture believable athletic movement.

That's why I prefer photographing real athletes whenever possible.

Someone who has performed a movement thousands of times carries themselves differently than someone performing it for a photograph. Their grip, stance, posture, timing, and reaction to effort are instinctive.

It also allows the photography to move faster.

Instead of spending a production teaching movements or endlessly recreating them, we can concentrate on light, composition, products, wardrobe, angles, and the moments happening around the workout.

The finished photographs can be highly produced without feeling artificial.

Reaching for the rope above, the athlete climbs through the rig surrounded by gymnastic rings and climbing ropes.

Holding a loaded barbell overhead, the athlete works between wooden plyometric boxes as gymnastic rings hang in the foreground.

Dark and Gritty Doesn't Have to Mean Cliché

Fitness advertising has developed a familiar vocabulary: sweat, chalk, dramatic expressions, heavy weights, dark rooms.

Those elements can work, but repeating them isn't enough.

The environment, athlete, product, and brand should determine what the photographs look like.

Sometimes that means hard directional light and deep shadows. Sometimes it's a quieter portrait between sets. Sometimes the strongest photograph isn't the lift itself, but the anticipation beforehand or exhaustion immediately afterward.

The visual treatment should support the story rather than become the story.

Ropes, rings and a Rogue rig fill the gym as athletes move through their workout.

Athlete stands beside a loaded barbell between efforts, still wearing wrist wraps.

Building a Fitness Campaign Around a Visual Direction

One advantage of establishing a dark visual direction before a shoot is that it gives the entire production a common language.

Hero photographs can live alongside portraits, movement, details, product imagery, and quieter documentary moments without feeling like they came from five different shoots.

That gives brands and agencies a deeper library of photographs to work with across a campaign.

And when a project calls for something completely different, I also photograph fitness with a brighter, more natural and colorful approach.

The style should always serve the project.

The athlete resets beside a heavily loaded barbell, his tattoos catching the light.

Athletes work around loaded barbells as gymnastic rings and the rig fill the foreground and background.

Dark Fitness and Athletic Photography

I photograph fitness and athletic campaigns for brands, advertising agencies, athletes, and companies throughout Colorado and across the country.

My fitness work ranges from dark, controlled, high-contrast photography to bright, colorful active lifestyle imagery depending on the visual direction of the campaign.

The common thread is making photographs that feel believable.

View my Dark + Gritty Fitness portfolio to see more of this work, or get in touch to discuss a photo shoot or image licensing.

Between efforts, an athlete sits exhausted on a loaded barbell.

Athletes having fun together after a workout in a warehouse gym.

Where Basketball Begins

The Basketball Courts We Grew Up On

Before basketball became arenas, sneaker deals, and prime time, it was something smaller. More personal.

A hoop over the garage. A crooked rim at the end of a driveway. A backboard nailed to a barn. A court behind a school where the lines had nearly disappeared. A patch of asphalt in a city park where games continued until nobody could see the rim.

For a lot of people who grew up with the game, those places are basketball.

They aren't particularly important on a map. Most will never host an organized game. Some barely qualify as basketball courts at all. But they're where countless people first learned to shoot, competed against siblings, played one-on-one with their father, stayed outside until dark, or imagined taking the final shot with a championship on the line.

That's what makes them worth remembering.

At the edge of a rural field, the basketball hoop and seesaw sit beneath the setting sun.

Before There Was a Gym

Basketball doesn't require much.

A ball. A rim. Something resembling a backboard. Enough ground to take a few dribbles.

That's one of the things that has always made the game so accessible, and why basketball hoops appear in such unlikely places across America.

They stand beside barns and cornfields, behind churches, on telephone poles, in empty lots and at the ends of rural roads. Some are carefully installed. Others seem to have been assembled from whatever happened to be available.

The setting changes, but the invitation is always the same.

Pick up a ball and shoot.

The Hoop at Home

For many players, the most important basketball court they ever knew wasn't really a court.

It was the driveway.

That's where repetition happened. Ten free throws before dinner became fifty. Fifty became a hundred. Games of HORSE turned competitive. Brothers and sisters settled arguments with one-on-one. Parents rebounded while their kids shot.

The hoop became part of the house.

Years later, the house might be sold and the driveway might belong to somebody else, but people remember exactly where they stood to take those shots.

Beside a vintage car, the basketball hoop stands above a large woodpile in a working yard.

Across the open field, a lone basketball hoop stands with rock formations stretching across the horizon.

Basketball in Small-Town America

Drive through enough of America and basketball hoops begin to appear everywhere.

Small towns have their own versions of Madison Square Garden.

A faded court behind an elementary school. Two rims beside a community center. A hoop overlooking farmland. A backboard standing alone in a place where there doesn't seem to be another person for miles.

These courts aren't surrounded by thousands of spectators. Most of the time they're completely empty.

That's part of what makes them interesting.

Without players, uniforms or crowds, the hoop becomes something else. It becomes part of the landscape and a marker of the people who live there.

Beside a picnic table and rope swing, the basketball hoop stands beneath a changing sky.

Against an American flag, a worn backboard and rim stand strong as a symbol for the love of the game in America.

A weathered backboard and rim stand against a dark, changing sky.

Farm Ball

Some basketball hoops seem inseparable from where they stand.

A hoop beside a barn isn't simply a place to play basketball. It says something about the people who put it there.

Work and play occupy the same ground. Chores get finished and somebody starts shooting. A patch of dirt or concrete becomes a court because that's the space available.

There doesn't need to be a gym nearby.

There just needs to be a hoop.

Between weathered barns and a silo, a basketball hoop stands in an open patch of ground.

Inside the barn, a basketball hoop hangs above stacked hay bales where work and play share the same space.

Barn Ball — View the Fine Art Print

Every Court Has a Story

The longer you look at old basketball hoops, the more questions they create.

Who put it there?

Who played on it?

How many games happened underneath it?

Who left town and still thinks about that court?

The photographs can't answer those questions. That's part of their appeal.

An empty basketball court leaves room for the viewer's own memories.

Someone who grew up playing in Indiana may see something completely different from someone who learned the game on a playground in New York. A former player sees one thing. A coach sees another. A parent who spent years rebounding for a child sees something else entirely.

The photograph stays the same.

The story brought to it changes.

Using a railroad crossing sign as a backboard, this hoop stands in a dry landscape far from a traditional court.

After dark, basketball courts sit beneath the mountain with the surrounding lights visible beyond the fence.

American Backcourts

For more than 15 years, I've photographed basketball hoops and courts while traveling throughout the United States and beyond.

The project became American Backcourts.

It was never intended to document the best courts or the most famous places in basketball. The photographs are about the opposite: ordinary places where the game exists quietly as part of everyday life.

Some courts were found deliberately. Most weren't.

They appeared along highways, behind buildings, in neighborhoods and small towns, beside farms and in places where stopping the car seemed mandatory.

Over time, the collection became less about basketball itself and more about place, ingenuity, community and the peculiar ways people make the game their own.

American Backcourts has been featured by ESPN, NBA TV, SLAM and in fine art photography books, among others, but the subject of the photographs has remained remarkably simple.

A hoop.

A place.

And evidence that somebody, at some point, wanted to play.

A makeshift backboard and rim are attached to a wooden utility pole beside the road.

The Places We Remember

Basketball changes as people get older.

The games become less frequent. The knees hurt a little more. The driveway where you learned to shoot might not belong to your family anymore.

But certain places stay remarkably clear.

You remember the sound of the ball.

You remember where the cracks were in the pavement.

You remember the spot you weren't supposed to shoot from.

You remember playing until it was too dark to see.

Maybe that's why an old basketball hoop can carry so much weight.

It's an ordinary object capable of bringing back an entire part of someone's life.

And somewhere in America, there's probably still a ball bouncing underneath one.

The basketball hoop appears in the reflection of standing water beneath the cloudy sky.

American Backcourts Fine Art Prints

A selection of photographs from American Backcourts is available as signed fine art prints.

Created from more than 15 years of photographing basketball hoops and courts across America, the collection includes rural backboards, backyard hoops, small-town courts and other places where the game becomes part of the landscape.

Explore American Backcourts Fine Art Prints

More American Basketball Photography

Basketball in Europe

Vietnam Hoops

Snow covers the ground around a weathered barn where a small basketball hoop remains in place through winter.

A folding chair faces the lone hoop across an open landscape, with no court, crowd or scoreboard in sight.

Americana vs. America

Beyond Route 66: Photographing America Without the Nostalgia

Route 66 has become one of the most recognizable symbols of the American road. Its neon signs, old gas stations, diners, motels and vintage cars have created a visual language recognized around the world. There is real history there, and good reason for much of it to be preserved. But somewhere along the way, the mythology surrounding Route 66 began to overshadow the road itself.

Drive enough of it today and the experience can start to feel like America performing an older version of itself. Restored gas pumps, murals, tchotchke’s, bumper stickers, and businesses carefully maintaining a mid-century aesthetic all reinforce an image we've already been taught to recognize. And the whole time it just feels like you’re being funneled to the Gift Shop, but it raises a more interesting question: Is Americana the same thing as America?

For Roadside Meditations, the answer has always been found elsewhere.

Sunlight falls across a red diner booth and a table set with condiments beside the window.

In Rock Springs, a weathered storefront shows peeling paint, colorful window displays, and a glass entrance marked 447.

Americana Isn't the Same Thing as America

Americana has developed a familiar visual shorthand. An old pickup truck, a weathered barn, a faded Coca-Cola advertisement and a diner with chrome stools immediately communicate a certain idea of America. These things are genuinely part of the country's visual history, but they represent only a small piece of it.

Most of America doesn't look like that.

It looks like Dollar General. It looks like a modular home sitting beneath an incredible mountain range, a new truck stop, a cell tower, an ugly strip mall or a motel somebody painted an inexplicable shade of pink 30 years ago. It looks like a hand-lettered sign made without any consideration for design and an intersection where nothing seems to belong together.

These places aren't trying to be Americana. They're simply America as it exists right now.

And that distinction matters.

Stone columns and brick buildings line a city street in the Mid West.

Dry grass and leafless brush surround a fenced-in structure along the roadside.

When the Photograph Has Already Been Chosen

Part of the appeal of traveling with a camera is not knowing where the next photograph will come from. Hours can pass without anything happening, followed by something glimpsed at 60 miles an hour that demands a U-turn.

There may be nothing historically significant about the place. It may not appear on a map beyond an address. Nobody has identified the best angle, written about its history or suggested that anyone should stop.

The photographer has to decide whether it matters.

That uncertainty disappears when a place becomes an attraction. The famous motel, historic filling station and iconic roadside sign arrive with their significance already established. Millions of photographs have been made there before. The visitor already knows what is worth seeing, so they hop out of the car, make their snapshot, then continue on without a second thought.

There is nothing inherently wrong with photographing those places. But there's something more interesting about having to find the photograph yourself.

Picnic tables sit beneath a roadside shelter overlooking the open landscape and distant mountains of the Salt Flats in Utah.

Two cushioned lounge chairs sit on the grass among fallen leaves in an everyday residential setting.

A small-town street runs beneath a mountain, with utility poles and low buildings along the roadside in Green River, Utah.

The America Between the Attractions

The American roadside is enormous, and most of it isn't famous.

Thousands of towns sit along state highways, county roads and old commercial routes without ever becoming destinations. Motels still operate without neon signs worth preserving. Bars open and close. New convenience stores replace old filling stations. Dollar stores appear on the edges of towns. Warehouses and subdivisions spread into landscapes that were empty a decade earlier.

This is the America that tends to disappear from romantic depictions of the road.

Yet these places say just as much about the country as the things we've decided to preserve.

Roadside Meditations grew from years spent moving through these environments, often while traveling somewhere else. The photographs weren't made from a list of landmarks or along a predetermined historic route. They accumulated through looking and paying attention to places that were easy to pass by.

Empty roads. Small towns. Motels. Storefronts. Parking lots. Signs. Deserts. Industrial buildings. Sometimes beautiful. Sometimes awkward. Sometimes funny or bleak. Often difficult to explain.

Together, they form a different kind of American road trip.

A paved road curves away through dry country, with a mountain at the horizon.

For sale signs are posted at a storefront where a piano and a few chairs are visible through the glass.

We Keep Photographing the America That Used to Exist

Nostalgia is selective.

When the American roadside is romanticized, certain things tend to make the cut. Neon instead of LED. An independent motel instead of a Hampton Inn. A classic pickup instead of a Toyota Camry. An old diner instead of Taco Bell. A hand-painted sign instead of a digital billboard.

There are obvious reasons for this. The older things often have more character and frequently make better photographs.

But constantly removing the present from pictures of America creates its own kind of fiction.

A photograph made today doesn't have to look as though it could have been made in 1957 to have value. The architecture, businesses, signs and infrastructure being built now are becoming part of the country's visual history whether anyone considers them beautiful or not.

Today's ordinary is tomorrow's history.

A plate of dessert sits on a diner table in small town America.

A decrepit house and yard in a small Wyoming town.

The Landscape Doesn't Have to Be Beautiful

The same problem exists with landscape photography.

Certain places arrive with their importance already established. Monument Valley, Yosemite, the Grand Canyon and countless other landmarks have become part of a shared visual vocabulary. Stand in front of one of them in beautiful light and the subject is already doing an enormous amount of work.

The ordinary landscape asks more questions.

Why photograph a closed laundromat in a town of 800 people? What is interesting about a gas station surrounded by empty land? Why stop for an awkward building, a telephone pole, a parking lot or a road disappearing behind a warehouse?

Often there isn't a photograph.

Occasionally there is.

Finding it requires looking at the landscape without first deciding what deserves to be beautiful.

Open farmland stretches beyond a baseball field in Iowa.

A pickup truck turns through a quiet street beside an older building in a run down Mid West town.

A roadside motel sits among dry grass and utility poles with snow-covered mountains rising behind it.

Photographing America as It Exists

None of this makes Route 66 somehow less "real" than the places beyond it. The restored diners, souvenir shops, vintage cars and tourists standing beneath Route 66 signs are all part of contemporary America too.

The distinction is about intention.

There's a difference between photographing a place that has already been culturally designated as Americana and discovering something ordinary that happens to reveal something about America.

The latter leaves more unanswered.

There is no established story. No prescribed nostalgia. No assurance that the thing being photographed is important at all.

That uncertainty is part of what makes the American roadside endlessly interesting.

A vast Utah landscape opens across dry grasses toward a distant mountain range beneath a cloudy sky.

Roadside Meditations

The photographs in Roadside Meditations were made over more than a decade and hundreds of thousands of miles traveling throughout the United States. Eventually, 75 of those photographs became a fine art photography book published by Kehrer Verlag.

The project isn't intended as a guide to the American road or a collection of its greatest hits. It's a record of paying attention to the spaces between destinations: towns, buildings, landscapes and strange little moments that might otherwise disappear through the windshield.

Some of those places are already gone. Others have changed. Many probably still look almost exactly the same.

That's part of the point.

America doesn't need to look like Americana to be worth photographing.

Sometimes the most revealing places aren't the ones preserved to remind us what the country used to look like. They're the ordinary places showing us what it looks like right now.

And there are millions of miles of them beyond Route 66.

The dilapidated facade of an old apartment in the Mid West.

In a small Illinois town, concrete grain silos rise behind an Irish pub.

Explore More American Photography

Barbershop of America (All 50 States)

America From The Road

Bars and Motels

Pugsly's Barbershop

Pugsly’s Barbershop, 15 Years Later

Photographing a Kingston, New York Barbershop Across Three Visits

One of the unexpected benefits of working on the same photography project for more than 15 years is getting the chance to go back.

When I started Barbershops of America, the goal was fairly simple: travel around the country and photograph traditional barbershops. I certainly wasn't thinking about what it would mean to photograph the same people and places multiple times over the course of 5, 10, or 15 years.

Pugsly's in Kingston, New York is one of the places that has given me that opportunity.

I've now photographed The Nefarious Dr. Pugsly three different times during the life of this project. The first was at his original barbershop. The second and third were at Pugsly's SideShow, the second shop he opened a short distance away.

Put together, those photographs tell a different kind of story than any single visit could.

Pugsly’s Traditional Barber Shop seen from the street in Kingston, New York.

Barbers work on haircuts across the shop, with the checkered floor and decorated walls visible throughout the space.

Barber trims a client's hair beside the front window, surrounded by the working details of the shop.

The First Visit: Pugsly’s Original Barbershop

I first met Pugsly sometime around 2011. I honestly don't remember exactly how we connected, which is true of quite a few relationships that came out of the early years of this project. What I do remember is him and the shop.

At that point I had already photographed plenty of old neighborhood barbershops, but Pugsly's felt different. It had all the visual references of a traditional American barbershop, but it wasn't an old shop that had simply survived unchanged for decades.

Pugsly had built his place very deliberately.

He was part of a generation of barbers who clearly respected the history of the trade but weren't interested in simply preserving it. There was an obsessive attention to the space, the tools, the haircut, and the experience of being there.

Years later, when I interviewed him, Pugsly described his intention as creating a traditional walk-in gentleman's barbershop with a 1940s influence, while making the quality of the haircut and the experience equally important.

That philosophy was visible before I ever knew how to put it into words.

And it made the shop an important part of Barbershops of America.

Pugsly smiling in his straw hat and glasses during a portrait inside the shop.

Through the front window, a haircut is underway inside Pugsly’s Barbershop in Kingston, New York.

Hair clippings on the floor capture a small detail from a day of work inside the shop.

A haircut in progress at Pugsly's Barbershop, surrounded by the shop's photographs, artwork, and vintage decor.

Warm light, vintage details, and a barber chair waiting for the next client.

A Second Shop: Pugsly’s SideShow

By the time I returned, Pugsly had opened another shop.

Pugsly's SideShow wasn't intended to be a copy of the original. It grew out of a practical problem with the first shop: people were waiting too long.

The original was built around the traditional walk-in model. SideShow was appointment-based and gave Pugsly an opportunity to create something slightly different.

It also looked different.

The original shop leaned heavily into the visual language of the classic American barbershop. SideShow was more eccentric and personal. It still had one foot planted firmly in barbering tradition, but there was more room for Pugsly's other influences: cars, motorcycles, custom culture, music, signs, paint, and all the strange objects that somehow make perfect sense when they're together in the same room.

I photographed SideShow for the first time during the final push for the Barbershops of America book.

The timing wasn't exactly ideal.

I was crossing the country and the only opportunity I had to photograph the shop was Christmas Eve. Pugsly opened the place anyway.

That's the kind of thing I remember as much as the photographs.

Inside Pugsly’s Sideshow, vintage decor and barber stations fill the Kingston, New York shop.

Taxidermy and vintage barber shop details surround the entryway inside Pugsly’s SideShow.

Between cuts, there’s always time for a laugh.

Vintage kegerator and memorabilia fill a corner inside Pugsly’s SideShow.

Going Back Again

In 2026, I found myself back in Kingston.

By this point, Barbershops of America had been part of my life for more than 15 years. I had photographed roughly 250 barbershops across all 50 states, published a book, driven an unreasonable number of miles, and watched plenty of the places I photographed disappear.

So I went back to SideShow.

This was the third time I had photographed Pugsly and the second time I had photographed this particular shop.

There was no need to recreate the photographs from the previous visits. That isn't really the point.

The point was to photograph what was there now.

A barbershop isn't a movie set. Things move. Objects accumulate. Chairs get worn. Walls fill up. People get older. Businesses evolve. Something that seemed completely ordinary during the first visit can become significant simply because it is still there years later.

And things that seemed permanent sometimes disappear.

Seen from the street, barbers work with clients inside Pugsly’s Sideshow.

A busy day at Pugsly's Sideshow - barbers working across the shop's row of chairs and detailed interior.

The Pugsly's team outside the shop.

What 15 Years Does to a Photograph

This is the part of Barbershops of America that has become increasingly interesting to me.

When I started the project, I was primarily documenting places.

Now I'm documenting time.

A photograph of a barbershop made today can be interesting because of the people, light, architecture, objects, or activity happening inside the frame. But make another photograph of that place ten years later and suddenly the first photograph contains information you didn't realize you were recording.

The haircut on the wall. The price board. The magazines. The barber chair. The person sitting in it. The businesses next door. The way people dressed. The objects that disappeared and the ones that somehow never moved.

None of those things necessarily feel historic when you're standing there.

Time does that work for you.

That's why returning to Pugsly's matters to me.

Slicked-back hair and a tattooed neck as Pugsly works behind the chair.

Haircut underway at Pugsly's as several barbers work throughout the shop.

Straight-razor shaving in progress inside the barbershop.

More Than a Collection of Barbershops

For years I described Barbershops of America as a project about traditional barbershops across the United States.

That's still true, but after 15 years it feels incomplete.

The project has become a photographic record of a particular piece of American culture during a period when that culture has changed dramatically.

Some shops I've photographed have closed. Some barbers have retired or died. Others have expanded, moved, or passed their chairs to another generation. New shops have appeared that borrow heavily from traditions that nearly disappeared a generation earlier.

And a handful of places have allowed me to come back.

Those repeat visits are becoming some of the most valuable photographs in the archive because they allow the project to show something a single photograph can't:

what stayed, what changed, and what disappeared.

Pugsly's is now part of that story.

And hopefully this wasn't the last time I photograph it.

The “Be Nice or Leave” neon adds another layer to the shop’s character.

Between haircuts, conversation and laughter keep the shop moving.

Portrait of Pugsly inside his Kingston barbershop.

Barbershops of America

Explore the complete Barbershops of America project

View the Barbershops of America book

Shop Barbershops of America photography prints

More From the Project

Patsy's Barbershop
Albany, New York

Joe's Barbershop
Chicago, Illinois

Belmont Barbershop
Boise, Idaho

Signs, displays and a mounted taxidermy fill the background as Pugsly greets his client.

Pugsly’s SideShow barbers gather for a portrait in the shop doorway.

One Thousandth of an Inch: Mike Clark and the Art of the Bamboo Fly Rod

Inside South Creek Ltd. With Bamboo Fly Rod Maker Mike Clark

Inside South Creek Ltd. in Lyons, Colorado, where Mike Clark has spent nearly five decades building bamboo fly rods by hand.

Mike Clark has been building handmade bamboo fly rods at South Creek Ltd.since 1979.

Talk to any fly fisherman on the planet and the conversation will eventually focus on this fish or that fish they so gracefully put in the net, usually with a heavy and repeated emphasis on inches. One time I caught a 35-inch something or other on this river, yada yada yada. The fish gets a little bigger as the night goes on, as does the fight needed to land it.

Mike Clark is a perennial fly fisherman, and that’s obvious when you see him lay down a cast, but in his business he deals with one-thousandth of an inch. That’s how precise the measurements are on his custom handmade bamboo fly rods. And that’s one reason you’ll go on a two-year waiting list after putting down a deposit for one.

Most folks without the fly fishing disease cruise right through the charming town of Lyons, Colorado, population 2,000, give or take, on their way to Estes or Rocky Mountain National Park. It’s easy enough to do. Lyons sits where the plains begin folding themselves into the foothills, a place people often treat as a sandwich stop or the beginning of somewhere else.

Those in the know, however, go out of their way for South Creek Ltd.

Mike Clark inside South Creek Ltd. in Lyons, Colorado, surrounded by bamboo cane and generations of fly rod history.

It’s not a fly shop in the traditional sense. There aren’t aisles of plastic gadgets a grizzled guide insists you need before your next day on the river. Even from the sidewalk, you can tell this place is different.

Inside the large front windows are stunning trout mounts beneath plush maroon curtains, pulled back to reveal a pile of bamboo that stands from the floor and kisses the vaulted ceilings. Walk through the door and you’re greeted by a panorama of exquisite rods and reels lining the walls and filling antique glass display cabinets. Everywhere you look there is wood, metal, cork, cane, old photographs, fishing history and the accumulated evidence of a man who has spent most of his adult life thinking about fly rods.

The design, presentation and texture of the room make it feel less like a store than a private fly fishing museum or art gallery that, somehow, you’ve been allowed into. Move closer, though, and you’ll realize almost everything is for sale. Even a rod made more than a century ago.

South Creek Ltd. is also home to antique rods made by some of the craftsmenwho helped shape the history of bamboo fly fishing.

Mike doesn’t only sell his own custom rods. He deals in antiques made by many of the legendary craftsmen who came before him, which means the shop functions as both his place of business and a physical timeline of the craft. Pick something up and there’s a good chance Mike can tell you who made it, when they made it and why it matters.

Speaking of legends, there’s a framed photograph sitting on the counter showing three men in fishing gear beside a river. To the undiscerning eye, it’s just that: three guys on a fishing trip.Again, to those in the know, it’s something else entirely. One of them is Mike. Another is John Gierach, the great fly fishing writer and longtime Lyons resident. The third is A.K. Best, the world-famous fly tier. Both were dear friends of Mike’s. Both are now gone.

“I’m short on friends these days,” Clark says.

A handwritten note from the great Eric Clapton - a customer of South Creek.

He doesn’t dwell on it. That seems to be Mike’s way. At 79 years old, there’s plenty of history around him, but not much interest in turning sentimental about it. The articles are there. The rods are there. The stories are there if you ask. But there is also work to be done. And you don’t keep company like Gierach and Best for decades as an Average Joe.

The fact of the matter is that Mike Clark is one of the last of a dying breed. Few, if any, will ever rival the level of craftsmanship coming off his workbench, which sits in another space connected to the showroom. If you stop into South Creek on the right day, you might get a peek behind the curtain and see the master at work.

Mike's workbench bears the accumulated tools, materials and evidence of nearly five decades spent building bamboo fly rods.

At first, watching Clark in his element might seem almost unimpressive. You might wonder, What’s the big deal? And why the hell are these things so expensive? His rods start around $3,000 and go up when you add things like custom engraving, 24-karat gold plating or a leather rod tube.

The answer becomes clearer the longer you watch.

Mike started building bamboo fly rods in 1979 and has been striving for perfection ever since. Nearly five decades of doing something over and over has a way of removing all the unnecessary movement. Today his actions are slow, fluid and economical. Nothing seems particularly difficult because he’s spent 47 years making sure it doesn’t.

Don’t be fooled.

Building a bamboo fly rod requires repeated handwork and measurements precise to one-thousandth of an inch.

Each rod is one of one and goes through roughly 1,400 operations and inspections before Mike will consider letting it leave the shop.

That level of thought begins long before he touches a piece of bamboo, all of which has been seasoning for four years. Mike wants to know where you fish. What kind of water. What part of the world. What species you’re after. How you intend to use the rod.

Those answers matter because they determine what he builds.

South Creek isn’t a place where you click a few boxes online, enter a credit card number and wait for a tracking notification. The person making your rod wants to understand why you want it in the first place.

Mike cares.

Each custom rod begins with seasoned bamboo and is built for the water, species and fishing style of its eventual owner.

That’s what makes his rods coveted. It’s also why he has no problem throwing one in the garbage if it isn’t 100 percent to his liking, even if the flaw is so minute that nobody other than Mike Clark would ever know it existed.

Think about that for a minute. After all the hours, all the individual operations, all the measurements and all the accumulated knowledge required to get a rod nearly to completion, nearly perfect still isn’t good enough.

Decades of repetition have made Mike's movements at the bench slow, deliberate and economical.

There are innumerable ways Mike could increase production. He knows that. There are machines that could make certain processes faster. He could hire more people. Streamline things. Increase output. Make more money.

He doesn’t care.

The final product is the concern because Mike knows the rod will outlive the person who ordered it.

His clients don’t buy these things because they need another fly rod. You can catch trout perfectly well with a mass-produced graphite rod that costs a fraction of the price. Mike will be the first person to remind you of that.

“The fish don’t care how much your rod costs,” he says.

That might be the best explanation for South Creek.

The fish don’t care.

The fisherman does.

Roughly 1,400 operations and inspections go into a Mike Clark bamboo fly rod before it leaves South Creek Ltd.

A Mike Clark rod will be cherished by its owner, then very likely handed to a son or daughter, and perhaps someday to someone who hasn’t even been born yet.

But Mike doesn’t build them to be mounted over a fireplace.

He builds them to be fished. To get wet. To be carried through brush. To bend against trout. To create memories. And maybe, decades from now, to create somebody else’s memories.

That philosophy makes more sense when you step into his workshop.

The place feels lived in because it is.

Mike’s lifetime of passion and hard work can be felt at the bench and in everything surrounding him. Antique wood cabinets are filled with tools. Exotic materials occupy corners. Photographs and art hang on the walls. Objects have naturally migrated into the places where they belong after years of use.

The details that separate one rod from another can be nearly invisible to everyone except the man who made it.

His domain reminds me of an old barbershop. Not one of the new ones designed to look old, but the real thing. A place where the tools, cabinets, pictures and furniture have developed a certain patina that can’t be bought or manufactured.

It only comes from repetition. From someone standing in the same place and doing the same thing well for a very long time.

Look at the linoleum around the chair in an old barbershop and you can see where the barber stood during decades of haircuts. Mike’s shop has that same feeling. You can feel his presence at the bench as he works each piece of cane down to one-thousandth of an inch.

There is something almost comical about that number when you consider how fly fishermen normally measure things.

We brag in inches.

Mike works in thousandths.

Mike doesn't build his rods to hang over a fireplace. He builds them to be fished.

At 79, Clark moves and talks with the bravado of a man with nothing left to prove. His Missouri roots never faded, and there’s a swagger to him, but it doesn’t come across as arrogance. It’s closer to the confidence of someone who knows exactly what he can do because he has spent nearly half a century doing it.

More importantly, he knows what happens after one of those rods leaves Lyons.

Someone takes it to a river.

Maybe in Colorado. Maybe Montana. Maybe halfway around the world.

They string it up. Step into the water. Make a cast.

Eventually, if things go right, a trout eats.

And for a moment, all those years of experience, four years of aging bamboo, 1,400 operations and inspections, and measurements made down to one-thousandth of an inch disappear into something wonderfully simple: a fisherman standing in moving water with a bent rod in his hand.

Meanwhile, Mike sits at his bench figuring out how to make an even better one.

After years of experience, thousands of individual steps and measurements made to one-thousandth of an inch, the rod eventually arrives where Mike intended it to be: on the water.

Photography & words by Rob Hammer

About the Photographs

I've spent years photographing fly fishing throughout Colorado and the American West, but the culture surrounding the sport has always interested me as much as what happens on the water. The people, places, traditions and skills behind fly fishing tell a much larger story.

Photographing Mike Clark at South Creek Ltd. is also part of a broader interest in people who have dedicated their lives to doing something well. Whether it's a bamboo rod maker in Colorado, a cowboy working cattle, a barber who's stood behind the same chair for decades or craftspeople making leather by hand, I'm drawn to work that still bears the evidence of the person who made it.

Explore more: Fly Fishing Photography | Fine Art Fly Fishing Prints | At Work Photography

Inside One of America’s Oldest Leather Tanneries

Inside Wickett & Craig: Photographs of an American Leather Tannery

Leather is part of our everyday lives, but most people never give any thought to what it is or where it comes from. After more than 6 years photographing working cowboys and ranches throughout the American West, I'm accustomed to seeing it everywhere: saddles, reins, bridles, chaps, boots, belts, and countless other pieces of gear. Usually, by the time I photograph it, the leather has already spent years being worked hard.

The Wickett & Craig tannery in Curwensville, Pennsylvania, offered an opportunity to see the other end of that story.

Founded in 1867, Wickett & Craig has been making leather for more than 150 years and is one of the few remaining specialty vegetable tanneries in the United States. The company spent its first 123 years in Toronto before moving to Pennsylvania around 1990, where it now operates a large tannery producing millions of square feet of leather each year.

I went there to photograph the people, machinery, and process behind it.

Hides move through one of the working areas inside Wickett & Craig.

Inside an American Leather Tannery

There isn't much about the inside of Wickett & Craig that feels designed for visitors. It's a working industrial building, and nearly every surface shows evidence of what happens there. Pipes run overhead, hides hang throughout the facility, enormous drums occupy entire sections of the building, and years of water, oils, dyes, tannins, and production have left their marks on the floors, walls, and machinery.

That's exactly what made the place interesting to photograph.

I've always been attracted to working environments where nothing has been cleaned up or arranged for the camera. There is already enough visual information in a place like this. The challenge isn't creating something interesting, but figuring out how to organize what is already happening into a photograph.

Wickett & Craig operates on more than 16 acres and produces roughly 4.5 million square feet of leather annually. Walking through the tannery, the scale of that production is immediately apparent. Hides are stacked, hanging, stretched, soaked, rolled, and fed through machinery as they move from one part of the building to another.

The finished leather most people recognize is still a long way off.

Hides hang over the tanning vats as they move through the vegetable tanning process.

Leather is handled by hand in the tannery's wet processing areas.

Making Vegetable-Tanned Leather

Wickett & Craig specializes in vegetable-tanned leather, a traditional method that uses naturally derived tannins to transform raw cattle hides into leather. Compared with modern chrome tanning, vegetable tanning is a considerably slower process. At Wickett & Craig, the complete transformation takes roughly six weeks.

The hides come from North American cattle and first have to be prepared, rehydrated, dehaired, fleshed, and split before tanning begins. From there they move into a tanning yard containing 72 vats filled with a proprietary tanning liquor that includes natural extracts from mimosa and quebracho. The hides spend approximately two weeks in the tanning solution.

After tanning, the leather moves through a series of processes that determine its eventual thickness, color, feel, and finish. Large rotating drums are used for dyeing and conditioning. Oils and waxes are worked into the leather, while products such as Wickett & Craig's English Bridle and Harness leathers receive additional treatment with waxes and tallows.

Eventually the hides are stretched across large perforated screens and moved into a climate-controlled drying area. After several days of drying, they continue through finishing and grading before leaving the tannery.

Understanding the basic process helps explain the photographs, but what interested me most wasn't the individual sequence of steps. It was seeing how much physical work still exists inside an operation producing leather at this scale.

A brief pause in the work, surrounded by leather and processing machinery.

The People Behind the Process

Machines do a lot of the heavy work at Wickett & Craig, but the tannery doesn't feel automated.

Workers are constantly handling the material, moving hides, operating equipment, checking leather, guiding it through machines, and preparing it for whatever happens next. Even with the size of the facility and machinery, there is a very human rhythm to the place.

That's something I've always been drawn to photograph.

People who have done the same kind of work for years develop an efficiency that is difficult to fake. Movements become automatic. They know how a piece of material should behave and recognize when something isn't right. That kind of physical knowledge is visible even when you don't fully understand the job yourself.

Photographing people who are actually working also changes my role as a photographer. There is very little reason for me to direct anything. I can watch, learn the rhythm of what is happening, and try to anticipate where the next photograph might be.

The goal isn't to make the tannery look cleaner, prettier, or more dramatic than it is. The worn machinery, wet floors, stained walls, work clothes, hanging hides, and odd industrial light are all part of the place. Removing those things would remove much of what makes it worth photographing.

Handling a hide this size takes two people.

Conveyors, hanging hides, and machinery fill this section of the production floor.

A Tannery With More Than 150 Years of History

Wickett & Craig began making leather in Toronto in 1867 and remained there for more than a century. When the company relocated around 1990, it moved to Curwensville, a small Pennsylvania town in a region with its own long history of tanning and leather production.

Today, the company occupies a facility covering more than 16 acres. Although the machinery and production requirements have evolved over the years, Wickett & Craig continues to specialize in vegetable tanning at a time when much of the world's leather is produced using faster methods.

There is something compelling about seeing an old process continuing at a meaningful industrial scale. This isn't a demonstration of how leather used to be made or a historic workshop preserved for visitors. People are coming to work every day and producing leather that will be shipped to manufacturers and craftspeople around the world.

The history is interesting, but the fact that the work is still happening is what matters.

Photographing People at Work

The photographs from Wickett & Craig also fit into a much broader subject I've returned to throughout my career: people at work.

I've photographed inside barbershops across all 50 states, on cattle ranches throughout the American West, and in workshops, factories, and other places where people make things or work with their hands. The occupations are different, but many of the things that attract me to them are the same.

Working environments develop their own visual language. Tools end up in particular places because that's where they're needed. Buildings change around the work being done inside them. Clothing gets stained and machinery gets worn in predictable places. The environment gradually becomes a record of the work itself.

The people change too. Someone who has performed a task thousands of times moves differently from someone doing it for the first time. Those small gestures and routines often make better photographs than anything I could have staged.

That's why I'm generally most comfortable photographing people while they're actually doing something. Once the work starts, my presence becomes less important. The person I'm photographing has something else to concentrate on, which allows the photographs to become less about the camera and more about what is actually happening.

Pipes, barrels, work tables, and leather give the production floor its distinctly industrial character.

Moving hides from one part of the tannery to another is part of the daily work.

From the Tannery to the Cowboy

My interest in Wickett & Craig also connects naturally to my ongoing Cowboy Photography project.

Leather is one of the fundamental materials of cowboy culture, although it's easy to overlook because it is so commonplace. A working cowboy may spend much of the day surrounded by it without ever thinking of leather as a material in the abstract. It has already become a saddle, reins, a bridle, boots, chaps, or a belt. It's equipment.

The leather I've photographed on ranches also tends to be at the opposite end of its life from what I saw at Wickett & Craig. Saddles have been shaped by years on horseback, reins darkened by hands, sweat, and weather, and boots scratched and covered in dust. Good leather records its use, which is part of what makes old cowboy gear so visually interesting.

At Wickett & Craig, I was seeing the material before any of that happened. Before a saddlemaker or leatherworker turned it into something useful, and long before years of work gave it the character I'm accustomed to photographing.

Some of the heavier leather produced at Wickett & Craig ultimately becomes saddles, bridles, straps, and other equestrian equipment. That creates a direct line between a tannery in a small Pennsylvania town and the ranches I've photographed thousands of miles away in the West.

Near the end of the process, leather passes through one of the tannery's finishing machines.

A brief pause after a long day of work, surrounded by leather and equipment.

A portrait between the carts of leather and large drums on the tannery floor.

The Work Before the Work

One of the things I like about photographing manufacturing is that it exposes parts of everyday objects that are normally invisible.

When you look at a well-made saddle, it's natural to think about the saddlemaker. You see the stitching, tooling, construction, and design and understand that someone had to know how to make it. What is much easier to forget is that the craftsman began with a material somebody else had already spent weeks making.

The same is true of boots, belts, bridles, and countless other leather goods.

By the time those objects reach the people who use them, the tannery has disappeared from the story. There is no obvious evidence of the vats, drums, drying racks, machinery, or workers in Pennsylvania who handled the leather long before it became a finished object.

That's part of what made Wickett & Craig worth photographing.

My Cowboy project is largely about documenting a working culture that still exists despite the tendency to talk about the American West in the past tense. The same idea applies here. Wickett & Craig isn't interesting simply because the company was founded in 1867 or because vegetable tanning is an old process.

It's interesting because people are still doing the work.

A hide comes into the tannery. Over the next several weeks, people and machines transform it into leather. That leather leaves Pennsylvania and becomes something else in somebody else's hands. Eventually, some of it will wind up on a horse or a ranch, where another kind of work begins.

The tannery and the cowboy might seem like two completely different subjects.

For me, they're connected by the same thing: the work.

Years of use show up in the tools and equipment around the tannery.

The work continues around the large processing machines inside the tannery.

Stacks of leather wait alongside the machinery and work areas throughout the facility.

Photographing Wyoming: Cowboys, Ranches & the Open Road

Wyoming Photography: Cowboys, Ranches, Small Towns & the American West

Weathered wooden corrals sit against the mountains in the distance.

I've spent a lot of time driving through Wyoming over the years, usually with somewhere specific to be and enough time built into the trip to stop when something catches my attention. And in Wyoming, that happens a lot.

Most photography of Wyoming understandably focuses on the obvious places. Yellowstone, wildlife, etc etc. All of which deserve the attention they get. But that's never really been what keeps me coming back with a camera.

I'm more interested in the Wyoming between those places.

The working ranches. Cowboys. Small towns. Rodeos. Bars. Old motels. Empty highways. People going about their lives. And all the strange, quiet things you find after enough hours on the road.

Over the years, those photographs have become part of several long-term bodies of work documenting the American West. Taken together, they tell a story about Wyoming that has less to do with its famous scenery and more to do with what it feels like to spend time there.

Worn cowboy boots sit among the tools and debris in a burned out building.

Photographing Wyoming Beyond The Instagram Hot Spots

There probably isn't another state in America as visually associated with the West as Wyoming. It's hard to separate the place from the mythology surrounding it.

The landscape certainly has something to do with that. Everything feels bigger. Towns are separated by enormous stretches of nothing. Weather can change quickly. Mountains appear on the horizon and stay there for hours.

But the longer I've photographed Wyoming, the more interested I've become in the evidence of people living inside that landscape.

A faded motel sign. An old truck parked outside a bar. A gas station in the middle of nowhere. Horses standing behind a fence. A main street that looks like it hasn't changed much in 40 years.

None of those things are unique to Wyoming on their own. Together, though, they start to describe the place in a way that another photograph of the Tetons can't.

That's the Wyoming I keep looking for.

An old car parked beside a dilapidated building adds another detail along the road.

A man holding a gun sits in his truck with a Trump flag hanging off the tailgate.

The old motel sits beside the road with rocky cliffs behind it.

Old signs and storefronts are part of the small-town landscape.

Wyoming Cowboy Photography

For the past several years, a significant part of my work has focused on working cowboys and ranches throughout the American West.

There's an enormous difference between photographing the idea of a cowboy and photographing someone who actually makes a living horseback.

The work isn't performed for the camera. Cattle need to be gathered and moved. Calves need to be branded. Fences need fixing. Horses need to be saddled. The weather doesn't care that you're trying to make photographs.

That's precisely what makes it interesting.

When I'm photographing cowboys in Wyoming, I'm not interested in manufacturing some romantic version of the West that doesn't exist. I'm interested in the things that happen naturally when people are doing work they've spent their lives learning how to do.

A rider disappearing into a cloud of dust. The way a horse and cowboy move together while sorting cattle. Frozen hands early in the morning. Long stretches where nothing particularly dramatic happens, followed by thirty seconds when everything happens at once.

Those moments are what have kept me working on this project year after year.

They also serve as a reminder that the American cowboy isn't simply a historical character. Ranching culture is still very much alive in Wyoming.

Weathered cattle corrals sit below the rolling hills on a working ranch in Wyoming.

First light illuminates a horses face on a working cattle ranch.

Working cattle brings the cowboy, horses, and land into the same frame.

Photographing Working Ranches in Wyoming

Access is everything when photographing ranches.

You can't understand much about a place by showing up for twenty minutes, making a few photographs and leaving. The pictures get better when people stop paying attention to the camera.

That takes time.

Over the years I've been fortunate to spend time on working ranches throughout the West, documenting cattle drives, brandings, roundups and the everyday work that happens between those bigger events.

Some of my favorite photographs aren't necessarily of cowboys at all.

They're the details surrounding the work. Saddles worn smooth from years of use. A pair of gloves sitting on a fence post. Steam coming off a horse on a cold morning. Trucks covered in dirt. Dogs waiting for something to happen. People standing around talking after the work is finished.

Those details say as much about ranching as the dramatic moments do.

The landscape is always present too. In Wyoming, it's impossible for it not to be. Ranching happens at a scale that can make a rider on horseback look insignificant against the country surrounding them.

That relationship between people, animals and land is a large part of what I'm trying to photograph.

Horse and rider move through the pasture as cattle gather nearby.

Cowboy portrait inside a working ranch workshop.

Small Town Wyoming

Long before I started seriously photographing cowboys, I was photographing the American road.

For years I've driven around the country making photographs of places and objects that aren't typically considered important enough to photograph. Motels. Diners. signs. Abandoned buildings. Old cars. Storefronts. Bars. Basketball hoops. And whatever else makes me pull over.

Wyoming is particularly good for that kind of wandering.

There are towns where the main street seems disproportionately wide for the number of people living there. Bars that might be the only place open for miles. Old motels hanging on beside highways that travelers now pass through without stopping.

Some places are changing quickly. Others feel like they exist in their own time zone.

That's what interests me.

Road trips are usually organized around destinations, but photography has taught me that the spaces between those destinations are often more interesting.

Wyoming has a lot of space between destinations.

And I've learned not to hurry through it.

Old clocks, weathered brick, and worn storefronts are part of the small-town landscape.

Small-town streets like this make it easy to slow down and look around.

Wyoming's main streets often run straight toward the mountains, with businesses and storefronts along the road.

The mountains rise behind the houses and streets of town.

Light from the window adds detail to the portrait.

Books, tools, and supplies fill the shelves and workbench of the shop.

A man works on a rifle at the crowded workbench.

Saddles and ranch gear fill the interior of the building.

Rodeo Culture in Dubois, Wyoming

Dubois is a small town in western Wyoming with a population of roughly a thousand people. During the summer, Friday nights mean rodeo.

I went there expecting to photograph the rodeo and came away much more interested in everything surrounding it.

Of course there were cowboys, horses, broncs and bulls. But there were also kids running around behind the chutes, families sitting in the stands, competitors talking before their events and all the little interactions happening away from the arena.

Afterward, a lot of the same people ended up at the local bar.

That's where the story became more interesting to me.

Cowboys who had been competing a few hours earlier were drinking, talking and dancing. Rodeo spectators mixed with locals. The distinction between the event and everyday life disappeared.

Those photographs became less about rodeo and more about a small Western community.

That's generally where I want the camera to be.

A cowboy carries an American flag through the rodeo arena.

Cowboys and spectators gather around the rodeo as the evening gets underway.

Horse and rider move through the arena in a blur of motion.

The night continues at the local bar after the rodeo.

Rodeo competitors and spectators mix together inside the bar after the events.

The rodeo continues into the evening at the local bar.

Wyoming Road Trip Photography

Driving is an enormous part of making this work.

There isn't really another way around it.

Wyoming rewards that kind of travel because the distances force you to slow down. You can drive for hours through country that initially appears empty before realizing how much is actually there.

Weather systems move across the horizon. Light changes constantly. Pronghorn appear beside the highway. Towns come and go in a few minutes.

Then there's all the human stuff.

Hand-painted signs. Old bars. Gas stations. Churches. Trucks. Motels. Ranch entrances. Buildings whose original purpose isn't immediately obvious.

I've missed plenty of photographs because I told myself I'd stop on the way back.

I've learned not to do that anymore.

If something makes me look twice, I turn around.

Sometimes it turns into a photograph. Most of the time it doesn't. That's part of the process.

There isn't a checklist for this kind of Wyoming road trip photography. I'm not driving from one famous overlook to another trying to reproduce photographs I've already seen.

The whole point is not knowing what I'm looking for until I see it.

The dirt road cuts through the open country and sagebrush.

Mountains rise behind the Golden West Motel and its roadside sign.

Open country and scattered trees stretch toward the mountains.

Weathered brick and an old storefront show the age of the building.

A fish-shaped sign adds another unexpected detail to a small Wyoming town.

Why I Keep Photographing Wyoming

The West has changed enormously, and it continues to change.

That's part of the reason I feel an urgency to keep photographing it.

I'm not interested in pretending Wyoming is frozen in some earlier era. It isn't. New houses go up. Old businesses disappear. Ranches change hands. Towns grow. People leave and other people arrive.

At the same time, there are aspects of life here that remain closely connected to the state's history.

People still make their living raising cattle. Cowboys still spend long days horseback. Small-town rodeos still bring communities together on summer nights. There are still roads where you can drive a long time without seeing another car.

The tension between those things interests me.

Photography can't preserve a place, but it can preserve evidence of what it looked and felt like at a particular moment.

That's enough reason for me to keep going back.

There will always be another road I haven't driven, another ranch I haven't visited, another town I've passed through too quickly.

And probably another reason to turn the truck around.

The Sandman Motel sign stands beside the road in town.

Ranch buildings and a livestock trailer sit in the snow below the mountains.

The Western Motel sits along the road beneath the rocky cliffs.

A basketball hoop stands against a brick building below the rocky hillside.

Fine Art Photography of Wyoming & the American West

These Wyoming photographs are part of my larger ongoing documentation of cowboy culture, working ranches, rural communities and everyday life throughout the American West.

A selection of the work is available as limited-edition fine art photography prints, produced using archival materials and available in a range of sizes and custom framing options.

The photographs aren't intended to present a polished or invented version of the West. They're records of people, places and moments I've encountered after years of traveling and photographing this part of America.

View the Full Cowboy Gallery

View Cowboy Photography Prints

View More Roadtrip Photography

View my Roadtrip Photography Book

The road runs through open country toward the mountains.

Sagebrush and open country stretch toward the mountain range.

The lake reflects the mountains and clouds across the open country.

The Grand Teton range rises above the landscape.

Alaska Fly Fishing Photographs

Alaska Fly Fishing Photography

Fly Fishing in Iliamna and the Remote Rivers of Alaska

There are very few places left where getting to the river is half the adventure.

In Alaska, a normal day of fly fishing might start by climbing into a de Havilland Beaver, taking off from Iliamna, and flying over a seemingly endless landscape of tundra, lakes, braided rivers, and mountains. From the air there are almost no signs of people. No roads leading to the water. No parking lots. Just river after river disappearing into country that seems to go on forever.

Then the pilot picks one.

The plane drops down, the floats hit the water, everyone unloads their rods and packs, and the Beaver disappears again.

Now you're standing in the middle of Alaska with a fly rod.

That's a hard experience to beat.

The flights were almost as exciting as the fishing, with the landscape stretching out below.

Rod and gear in hand, a fisherman crosses the tundra on the way to the water.

Photographing Fly Fishing in Alaska

I've photographed fly fishing in a lot of beautiful places over the years, but Alaska is different. Not necessarily because every photograph is more dramatic, but because everything surrounding the fishing becomes part of the story.

The airplanes. The pilots. The guides. The weather. The bears. The long drives down dirt roads. Wet waders hanging wherever they'll dry. Whisky and bear spray rolling around on the dashboard of an old truck.

And eventually, the fish.

That's what interested me most photographically. I wasn't trying to come home with a collection of pictures of people holding trout. I wanted the photographs to show what it actually felt like to be there.

The de Havilland Beaver waits on the river, ready for the next flight.

Fishing a stretch of water in the Alaskan backcountry.

After a day on the river, a silver salmon comes out of the water.

Flying Out of Iliamna

Iliamna is the kind of place that immediately makes you aware of just how enormous Alaska is.

From the air, the scale becomes ridiculous.

Rivers twist through the tundra without a building anywhere in sight. Lakes appear below the plane and stretch toward the horizon. Mountains and volcanoes rise in the distance. Every once in a while you spot another float plane or a small structure, but mostly you see empty country.

For a photographer, the flights were almost as exciting as the fishing.

I'd spend as much time looking out the window as possible, photographing the landscape below and watching the light change across the ground. Then we'd land somewhere completely different and start all over again on foot.

The view from the cockpit on the way to another remote river.

By evening, the lake reflects the mountains across the water.

The Fish Are Pretty Good Too

Of course, nobody travels all the way to Alaska with a fly rod because they don't care about fish.

The fishing can be absurd.

Rainbow trout, Arctic grayling, Dolly Varden, silver salmon and other salmon species move through these waters depending on the river and time of year. Some of the trout are the kind of fish that permanently screw up your expectations when you return home.

But Alaska also changes the way you think about a successful day of fishing.

You might spend an hour working a stretch of river only to have a bear wander into the same area and effectively end the discussion about who gets to fish there.

The bear wins.

Every time.

Bringing the fish to the net marks the end of another stretch on the river.

A rainbow trout rests in the net after being brought in from the river.

Fishing continues into the evening under an Alaskan sky.

An Arctic grayling comes out of the river after the day's fishing.

Sharing the River With Bears

Seeing a grizzly bear from the window of an airplane is one thing.

Standing in a river with one is another.

Bears are simply part of fishing in Alaska. You're traveling through their habitat and fishing for many of the same things they're looking for. Sometimes that means getting out of the water, backing off, and letting them do whatever they're going to do.

Those encounters have a way of immediately correcting your perception of where you stand in the food chain.

They're also part of what makes Alaska feel genuinely wild. Not wild in the marketing sense of the word. Actually wild.

You're a visitor there.

Four fishermen share the river with a grizzly bear in the distance.

Grizzly tracks cross the sand along the river, a reminder that fishermen are visitors here.

Fishing in Alaska comes with the occasional reminder that you're in bear country.

More Than Fishing Photographs

The older I get, the less interested I am in photographing only the obvious part of an activity.

A picture of someone holding a giant rainbow trout certainly has value, but it doesn't necessarily tell you what the trip felt like.

Sometimes the photograph that stays with you is a fisherman walking across an empty landscape.

Or a guide heading back toward the float plane.

A rod leaning against an old truck.

The view through the windshield on the way to the water.

Friends laughing at the end of a long day.

Those pictures fill in the spaces between the fish. And years later, they're often the ones that bring the experience back most clearly.

That's the part of fly fishing photography that continues to interest me.

On the road to the water, fishing gear and the day's essentials ride along on the dashboard.

Fishermen make their way across the river beneath the mountains.

Alaska From the Air

There is also something about seeing Alaska from a small airplane that changes your understanding of the place.

From the ground, you're standing beside one river.

From a few thousand feet up, you realize there are hundreds more.

They snake across the landscape in every direction, most of them inaccessible by road and many without another person anywhere nearby.

It's impossible to fly over that much water without wondering what's down there.

That's probably dangerous thinking for a fly fisherman.

From the air, Alaska's tundra stretches out in every direction, with rivers cutting through the landscape.

Lakes and mountains spread across the landscape below the float plane.

Far below the float plane, a braided river winds through the tundra.

Why Alaska Sticks With You

Eventually the plane comes back.

You load the rods, climb inside, put on the headset, and watch the river get smaller beneath you.

Tomorrow you'll probably fly somewhere else.

That's Alaska fly fishing.

Yes, there are big trout and salmon. That's certainly part of the attraction. But reducing Alaska to the size or number of fish misses most of what makes the place special.

It's the uncertainty of where you're going that morning. It's flying over country without roads. It's standing in a river and realizing a grizzly bear has considerably more authority over the situation than you do. It's the people you fish with and all the strange little moments that happen between leaving the lodge and coming home.

The fish give you an excuse to go.

Everything else is why you remember it.

Taking a break and sharing a laugh.

Fishing gear and an old truck are part of the routine between the road and the river.

From above, mountains and glaciers stretch across the landscape in every direction.

Fly Fishing Photography, Prints & Licensing

This Alaska series is part of my larger body of fly fishing photography documenting anglers, guides, rivers, and the culture surrounding the sport throughout the American West and beyond.

Select fly fishing photographs are available as fine art prints, and images from the Alaska archive are also available for commercial and editorial licensing.

View more of my fly fishing photography or browse available fly fishing photography prints.

For all licensing inquiries, contact me directly at rob@robhammerphotography.com.

Rivers and lakes wind through the tundra as the float plane passes overhead.

Bullet holes cover a weathered road sign along the road to the river.

Sharing a laugh between the flight and the fishing.

Working a stretch of river with a landing net.

Casting across the river with the mountains in the background.

The Saguache Crescent: Photographing the Last Linotype Newspaper in America

The Last Linotype Newspaper in America

There aren't many places left where you can watch someone make a newspaper with molten lead.But in the tiny town of Saguache, Colorado, Dean Coombs still does it every week.

Dean is the publisher, editor, printer, repairman and, by his own admission, not a particularly good janitor at the Saguache Crescent, a weekly newspaper that's been serving this small Colorado town since the late 1800s. While virtually every other newspaper in the world moved on to computers and modern printing technology decades ago, Dean still produces the Crescent using a Mergenthaler Model 14 Linotype machine that his family bought new in 1920.

It's believed to be the last newspaper in the United States, and possibly the world, still produced this way.

The Linotype and other printing equipment fill the workroom.

Rows of metal type slugs line the shelves throughout the print room.

The Saguache Crescent

Saguache sits in Colorado's San Luis Valley, a place that already feels somewhat removed from the speed of the rest of the world. The town has a population of only a few hundred people, and the Saguache Crescent fits naturally into that landscape.

The newspaper began in 1882 as the Saguache Advance and has been produced in the same building since 1902. Dean's grandparents bought the paper in 1917, and it has remained in the Coombs family ever since.

Dean was essentially born into it.

When he was a baby, his parents reportedly attached his carriage to the back of the printing press so the movement of the machine would rock him to sleep. He started working at the newspaper when he was 12.

His mother, Marie, set type and wrote stories. His father, Ivan, handled the printing. When Ivan died unexpectedly in 1978, Dean took over. The family still managed to get that week's paper out the following day. That tells you quite a bit about Dean and the Crescent. A newspaper comes out when a newspaper is supposed to come out.

For Dean, working at the Linotype is part of the weekly routine of producing the newspaper.

Individual brass matrices drop into place as newspaper copy is entered on the Linotype keyboard.

Printing a Newspaper With a Linotype Machine

The first thing that struck me about the Linotype wasn't necessarily how old it was. It was how physical the whole process is.Modern publishing is quiet. Sit at a computer, type some words, move things around on a screen and hit send.

This is the opposite.

The Linotype is big, loud, mechanical and complicated. There are gears, levers, chains, molds and moving parts everywhere. The machine looks like something you could spend a lifetime operating and still not completely understand.

Dean types the newspaper's copy on a keyboard that controls the Linotype. With every keystroke, a small brass matrix for an individual character drops from a magazine inside the machine.

Those matrices line up to form a complete line of text.Then things get really interesting. Molten metal is injected against the matrices, casting an entire line of type into a solid metal slug. That's where the name comes from: a "line o' type."

The individual lead slugs are then arranged by hand into columns. The words are upside down and backward, which Dean reads and organizes as naturally as the rest of us read a newspaper sitting at the kitchen table.

Eventually those columns become a page.

The page becomes a printing plate.

And the printing plate becomes the Saguache Crescent.

It's an enormous amount of work to produce something most of us barely think about.

The Linotype sits among the gears, chains, and other machinery that make the printing process possible.

Photographs, certificates, newspapers, and other reminders of the Crescent's history cover a wall in the office.

Metal shavings gather on the floor beneath the printing machinery.

A 100-Year-Old Machine That Still Has a Deadline

There is another problem with using a Linotype machine built in 1920.You can't exactly call the service department. If something breaks, Dean fixes it.

The walls of the Crescent are covered with tools, parts and the accumulated evidence of a century of keeping old machinery alive. Dean has spent enough time with the Linotype that he seems to understand it in the way someone understands an old truck they've owned forever. Maybe he doesn't know what every part is called or exactly why every piece does what it does. He knows when something isn't right. And it has to be made right because Tuesday is coming. That's one of the things I loved about photographing Dean. There wasn't any performance to it. He wasn't operating an antique machine for tourists or demonstrating a historical process at a museum. He was at work.

There was a newspaper that needed to be printed, subscribers who expected to receive it and a town that expected its local news. The fact that the process happens to involve technology invented in the 1880s almost seemed secondary to him. It's simply how he makes the paper.

Machinery, metal type, and printing supplies fill the workspace around Dean.

The printing press sits ready for another issue of the newspaper.

A portrait of Dean inside the Saguache Crescent, where he has spent most of his life producing the weekly newspaper.

Photographing Dean Coombs at Work

Visually, the Saguache Crescent is the kind of place I could spend days photographing. There is stuff everywhere. Tools hang from walls. Metal type fills drawers and work surfaces. Lead slugs pile up. Paper, machinery, handwritten notes and decades of accumulated newspaper history compete for whatever space remains.

Then, in the middle of all of it, is Dean.

What interested me wasn't just making photographs of an old Linotype machine. The machine by itself is interesting, but without Dean it's just an artifact. Dean is what makes the place matter.

He grew up with the newspaper. His parents worked there. His grandparents owned it before them. He has spent most of his life inside the same building, using the same process to deliver local news to generations of people in the same small Colorado town.

The more time I spent photographing him, the less the story felt like it was about obsolete technology. It was about continuity.

The weekly newspaper takes shape at the Linotype as Dean works through the printing process.

Close details of reversed type and images are visible across the metal printing plates.

When "Obsolete" Doesn't Mean Useless

The Linotype changed publishing when it was introduced in the 1880s. Before its invention, type had to be assembled largely by hand, one character at a time. Linotype allowed an operator to create an entire line of metal type at once and dramatically increased the speed at which newspapers and books could be produced.

For much of the 20th century, Linotype machines were everywhere. Then computers came along. The technology that had revolutionized publishing became obsolete itself. Newspapers modernized, Linotype machines disappeared and the specialized knowledge required to operate and repair them largely disappeared too.

Except in Saguache.

More than a century after Dean's family purchased their Mergenthaler Model 14, he was still sitting at its keyboard making a newspaper. There's something wonderfully unreasonable about that. From a business perspective, almost none of it makes sense. There are easier ways to do every step of the process.

But efficiency isn't always the same thing as value. The Crescent isn't being made this way because someone developed a clever marketing campaign around "old-fashioned newspaper printing." It's being made this way because this is how Dean knows how to make it.

Drawers packed with metal type hold the individual characters used to compose the newspaper.

Tools, parts, and supplies fill a wall in the newspaper office.

A Small-Town Colorado Newspaper

The technology can also overshadow the other important part of this story: the Saguache Crescent is an actual community newspaper. Dean isn't making a reproduction of an old newspaper. He's reporting on Saguache.

The stories are about the people who live there. Local government. Community happenings. The ordinary events that wouldn't mean much to someone living a thousand miles away but matter a great deal when it's your town and your neighbors.

At the time I photographed him, Dean was producing hundreds of copies every week for a community of only about 500 people. There's something fitting about a newspaper this local being produced by a process this personal. One man knows the stories. The same man sets the type. He keeps the machine running. He prints the paper.And then the people in town read it. There aren't many layers between the community and the finished product.

Metal type is arranged by hand for what is believed to be the last Linotype-produced newspaper in the United States.

The End of the Linotype Newspaper

The uncomfortable part of photographing places like this is knowing they aren't going to exist forever.

Dean doesn't have children to take over the Crescent, and he isn't training a successor.

It's difficult to imagine who could replace him.

Learning to operate a Linotype would only be the beginning. Someone would also have to learn how to diagnose and repair a century-old machine for which there isn't a technician coming from Denver when something goes wrong.

Then they'd have to want the lifestyle that comes with running a weekly newspaper. Dean has spent decades organizing his life around that Tuesday deadline. At some point, that will end. And when it does, an unbroken connection to an era when Linotype machines powered newspapers around the country may end with it.

That's part of why photographs matter.

You can't keep everything alive.

Sometimes all you can do is pay attention while it's still there.

The weekly newspaper comes together at the press as Dean handles the printing.

The Smithsonian Magazine Story

The photographs I made of Dean and the Saguache Crescent were eventually published by Smithsonian Magazine in April 2022 as part of the story "This Small-Town Newspaper Is the Last of Its Kind," written by Nick Yetto.

The article tells Dean's story in much greater detail and explains the history and mechanics of Linotype printing. Smithsonian described the Crescent as the last Linotype-produced newspaper in the United States and possibly the world.

But what has stayed with me most isn't the historical significance of the machine. It's Dean standing in that cluttered newspaper office, surrounded by a century's worth of tools and machinery, doing something almost nobody else on earth still knows how to do.

Not because he's trying to preserve history.

Because the paper has to come out Tuesday.

The gears and mechanical parts of the printing press show the physical work behind each issue of the newspaper.

More Documentary Stories

For more than two decades I've photographed people, places, traditions, and pieces of American culture that are easy to overlook and, in some cases, slowly disappearing.

Barbershops of America
For more than 15 years I've traveled through all 50 states photographing traditional barbershops and the people who keep them going.
[View Barbershops of America]

Cowboys & the American West
An ongoing photographic project documenting working cowboys, historic ranches, and the people continuing the traditions of the American West.
[View the Cowboy Photography Project]

American Backcourts
A long-term photographic study of basketball hoops and the landscapes surrounding them across the United States.
[View American Backcourts]

Roadside Meditations
Photographs made while traveling America's backroads, focusing on the quiet, strange, and often overlooked landscapes along the way.
[View Roadside Meditations]

Dean holds a copy of the Saguache Crescent, the weekly newspaper serving the Saguache community.

Downtown Saguache settles in for the evening in Colorado's San Luis Valley.

Small Town American Rodeo Photography

Behind the Scenes at a Wyoming Rodeo | Photographing Cowboy Culture in Dubois

There are photographs that happen in eight seconds.

Then there are photographs that take an entire evening.

The latter are the ones I usually come home thinking about.

For more than six years, I've been documenting working cowboys and ranches throughout the American West. The project has taken me from some of the largest cattle ranches in Texas, Nevada, Arizona, Montana, Nebraska, and Colorado to small family operations where the work still begins before sunrise. Much of that time has been spent photographing branding fires, calving season, horseback gathers, shipping cattle, and the quiet routines that define life on a working ranch.

Because of that, people often assume I'm a rodeo photographer.

I'm not.

At least not in the traditional sense.

I admire rodeo immensely. It preserves traditions born from everyday ranch work and gives cowboys and cowgirls a place to test skills that were once essential to earning a living. But what draws me to a rodeo isn't necessarily the competition itself.

It's everything surrounding it.

Last weekend I spent an evening at the Dubois Rodeo in western Wyoming, not looking for the winning ride or the biggest wreck, but for the moments that reveal the character of a community.

The fence line fills with spectators while riders and families watch the action from every angle.

The grandstands fill as the community settles in for another Friday night at the Dubois Rodeo.

Why I'm Not a Traditional Rodeo Photographer

My work has never been about documenting sporting events.

It's about documenting people.

While rodeo and ranching are deeply connected, they aren't the same thing. Most of my photographs are made on working ranches where there are no grandstands, announcers, prize money, or crowds. The stories unfold slowly, often over several days, and the photographs are built through trust rather than access.

That same approach follows me into a rodeo.

Instead of focusing solely on the arena, I find myself wandering toward the fences, the warm-up pens, the parking lot, and eventually the local bar after the last event ends. Those places often reveal more about Western culture than the arena itself.

If you're interested in the broader documentary project, you may also enjoy these stories:

• Silver Spur Ranch in Colorado – documenting riding health, calving season, and everyday ranch work.

• Spanish Ranch in Nevada – exploring one of the oldest horseback traditions in the American West.

• Dakota May: Rawhide Braiding – preserving a traditional craft that continues to serve working cowboys.

• Magnum Feedyard – an inside look at one of the final stops in the beef production chain.

Together, they form chapters of the same ongoing project.

The evening continues with riders positioned just outside the arena.

The pace changes quickly once the team roping begins under the arena lights.

The Dubois Rodeo Reflects Everyday Western Life

Dubois is the kind of town where a rodeo still feels like a community gathering instead of a production.

People arrive early.

Some watch from the grandstands.

Others sit on horseback outside the arena fence.

Children wander between pickup trucks while parents catch up with neighbors they haven't seen in a week.

As the evening progresses, the light changes dramatically. Summer storms drift across the mountains, sunlight briefly illuminates the cliffs above town, and the American flag circles the arena before the first event begins.

Those transitions are every bit as compelling as the competition.

One of my favorite photographs from the evening isn't of a bronc rider or a steer wrestler. It's of the flag rider galloping beneath Wyoming skies while the town settles into another Friday night tradition. Another shows families leaning against the fence simply watching together.

They're photographs about place.

About belonging.

About the pace of life in a small Western town.

Evening light reaches the cliffs above the arena as riders prepare for the night's events.

Rider moves through the arena as the rodeo continues.

The horses draw a crowd away from the arena.

Why Rodeos Matter to Cowboy Culture

Rodeos occupy a unique place in the American West.

Historically, many rodeo events grew directly from the skills required on working ranches. Roping, horsemanship, stock handling, and riding difficult horses weren't invented for entertainment—they were part of everyday work.

Today, rodeos preserve those traditions while serving another equally important role.

They bring communities together.

In many rural towns, the annual or weekly rodeo isn't simply entertainment. It's where multiple generations gather in one place. Ranch families, contestants, local businesses, visitors, musicians, and volunteers all contribute to an event that reflects the identity of the town itself.

That's what interests me most.

Not simply the competition, but the culture surrounding it.

Conversations continue long after the final event has ended.

People continue visiting around the rodeo grounds after the final event.

American flags remain lit in the parking area as the crowd begins to leave.

Looking Beyond the Arena

When the final event ended, many of the contestants and spectators made their way to a local bar.

The cowboy hats stayed on.

The conversations continued.

A country band took the stage.

Contestants who had been competing only an hour earlier were now talking with friends, laughing over drinks, and dancing with people they'd known for years.

Those photographs may never appear in a rodeo magazine.

But they say something important.

They remind us that cowboy culture doesn't end when the arena lights shut off.

It continues wherever people gather.

In conversations between friends.

In local music.

In family celebrations.

In worn dance floors and small-town bars that have served generations of ranch families.

Those moments rarely make headlines, yet they're often the photographs that feel most honest.

For many, the night continues at one of Dubois' longtime gathering places.- The Rustic Pine Tavern

The bar fills as another rodeo night gives way to conversation and familiar faces.

Conversations pick up where the rodeo left off.

Cowboy Culture Is More Than Ranch Work

One of the biggest misconceptions about my project is that it's exclusively about cowboys working cattle.

The work has always been broader than that.

Cowboy culture exists on ranches, certainly, but it also lives in rodeos, livestock auctions, county fairs, saddle shops, rawhide braiding shops, small-town cafés, and local bars after the rodeo is over.

Those places matter because they're where traditions are shared, friendships are maintained, and younger generations begin to understand the culture they're inheriting.

If we only photograph the work, we miss part of the story.

If we only photograph the competition, we miss another part.

I'm interested in documenting the spaces in between.

The moments that feel ordinary today but will become history tomorrow.

The evening continues inside the Rustic Pine Tavern.

Live music carries the evening forward after the rodeo has ended.

An Ongoing Documentary Project About the American West

These photographs from Dubois are one small chapter in a documentary project that has taken me across thousands of miles of the American West over the past six years.

Some stories happen during branding season.

Others unfold in remote mountain pastures or desert ranches.

Sometimes they happen beneath the lights of a small-town rodeo, and sometimes they continue hours later inside a crowded Wyoming bar where the music starts after the livestock trailers have already headed home.

Together, they tell a larger story—not simply about cowboys, but about a living culture that continues to evolve while remaining deeply rooted in tradition.

If you'd like to explore more of this ongoing work, I invite you to browse the rest of the Cowboy Project, including stories from working ranches, traditional craftsmen, and communities throughout the American West.

View Fine Art Prints From The Cowboy Series

Inside the Rustic Pine Tavern, the evening settles into conversation among mounted wildlife and worn wood walls.

A cowboy in a Wind River Rodeo shirt, chaps, and a 10 inch knife walks through the Rustic Pine Tavern.

Rawhide Braiding - A Western Cowboy Tradition

The Art of Rawhide Braiding: Inside the Workshop of Dakota May

There are some crafts that refuse to be hurried.

Rawhide braiding is one of them.

Long before synthetic ropes, factory-made tack and online catalogs, the working cowboy depended on gear built by skilled hands. Every bosal, mecate, set of reins and reata represented countless hours of preparation, patience and repetition. The quality of that work wasn't judged by how it looked hanging on a wall—it was judged by whether it held together after years of riding rough country.

Today, only a small number of artisans continue that tradition.

Among them is rawhide braider Dakota May.

I had the opportunity to photograph Dakota at work, documenting not only the finished pieces but the quiet, methodical process behind them. It quickly became obvious that this isn't simply leatherwork or craftsmanship. It's the preservation of an entire way of life.

The hide is stretched and secured to dry evenly before any strands are cut.

A freshly stretched hide dries on a round frame while Dakota May prepares it for the careful work that follows, preserving techniques passed down through generations of Western craftsmen.

More Than Beautiful Gear

To someone unfamiliar with the West, a braided bosal or set of romal reins might appear to be decorative artwork.

To a working buckaroo, they're tools.

Every strand serves a purpose. Every knot has a function. Every decision affects how the finished piece balances, flexes and performs in the hands of a horseman.

That marriage of beauty and utility has always fascinated me.

The finest examples of Western craftsmanship rarely separate art from function. The object becomes beautiful precisely because it was made to work.

Examining the hide is one of the first steps before it is cut into working strands.

The hide is carefully cleaned by hand before the braiding process begins.

Natural light helps reveal subtle variations in the hide before preparation continues.

What Is Rawhide Braiding?

Unlike leather, rawhide is made from animal hide that has been cleaned, stretched and dried without tanning. The material is incredibly strong, but it demands patience and precision.

Before a single braid is started, hours of preparation go into the material itself.

The hide must be carefully prepared, cut into long continuous strands, beveled to create smooth edges, and brought to exactly the right moisture content before braiding begins. If it's too dry, it becomes brittle. Too wet, and it loses consistency. Experienced braiders develop an instinct for working the material at precisely the right moment.

Only then does the real work begin.

Each strip is cut with precision, creating long, consistent strands that will eventually become handmade cowboy gear through hours of patient braiding.

Each strand is shaped with a beveling tool before the braiding begins.

A Tradition Passed Between Cowboys

Rawhide braiding has deep roots in the vaquero traditions of Spain, Mexico and the American West. For generations, the knowledge was passed from one cowboy to another on working ranches throughout the Great Basin, where winter evenings often became time to repair tack and learn the craft from older hands. Along with the techniques came stories, ranch histories and a shared culture that helped preserve the traditions of the buckaroo.

That heritage is still visible today.

Every braided piece carries echoes of the generations who came before.

Every strip is shaped and refined before it becomes part of a bosal, reins, or other cowboy gear.

Photographing Dakota May

Walking into Dakota's workspace, what struck me first wasn't the finished gear.

It was the pace.

There was no rush.

The rhythm of the work seemed almost meditative.

Hands moved almost automatically, weaving one strand over another before tightening each braid with quiet confidence. Knives, gauges and braiding tools rested nearby, worn smooth from years of use. Coiled strands of rawhide waited patiently for their turn.

Photography often rewards dramatic moments.

This wasn't one of them.

Instead, it rewarded paying attention.

The subtle pull of a strand.

The texture of unfinished rawhide.

The concentration required to tie a knot that disappears into the overall pattern.

Those details tell the real story.

Strand by strand, the braid takes shape through steady hands and practiced technique.

Each knot adds to the strength and balance of the finished rawhide reins.

Years of practice show in the smallest details, where decorative knots are tightened by hand to secure and finish the braid with precision.

Why Handmade Cowboy Gear Still Matters

Modern materials have replaced much of what working cowboys once relied on every day.

Synthetic ropes are stronger, cheaper and easier to maintain than traditional rawhide in many situations.

Yet handmade rawhide gear continues to be valued—not simply because of tradition, but because of the craftsmanship behind it.

Collectors appreciate it as functional art.

Horsemen appreciate the balance, feel and connection to generations of Western knowledge.

And for many makers, the process itself has become just as important as the finished product.

The work demands patience in a world that increasingly rewards speed.

Preserving the American West

One of the reasons I continue photographing working ranches and the people connected to them is because these traditions are easy to overlook.The American West isn't preserved only through landscapes or old photographs.

It's preserved through people.

Cowboys.

Saddlemakers.

Western Artists.

Horse trainers.

Rawhide braiders like Dakota May.

Each carries forward knowledge that has survived because someone took the time to learn it—and then took the time to teach it to someone else.

Those are the stories that deserve to be documented.

Because while handmade gear can last for generations, the knowledge required to create it only survives if someone is willing to keep practicing the craft.

As a photographer, I feel fortunate to witness—and preserve—small pieces of that story.

The finished rawhide Bosal reflects hours of careful preparation.

The Silver Spur Ranch - Cowboy Photography

Authentic Cowboy Photography at Silver Spur Ranch in Colorado

There are places where the seasons are measured less by the calendar than by the work that needs doing.

At Silver Spur Ranch in eastern Colorado, the cold times means calving and Summer brings long days horseback constantly moving cattle to fresh pasture. Winter has a way of stripping everything down to what matters. Through March snow, June grass, and December cold, the work stays much the same and so do the people who make their lives around it.

Over several visits to the Colorado division of Silver Spur Ranch near Elbert, I photographed cowboys riding health, moving cattle, and helping bring new calves into the world. Some moments were quiet. Others demanded quick decisions and hard work. None of it was staged.

These photographs are part of an ongoing effort to document the traditions, challenges, and everyday realities of working ranches across the American West.

Branding is a team effort that depends on timing and coordination.

Coffee comes before another day of ranch work.

A Historic Working Ranch in Eastern Colorado

Silver Spur Ranch is one of the largest and most respected cattle operations in the United States, with divisions spread across several states and a long history of stewardship and ranching traditions. The Colorado division near Elbert sits among rolling grasslands and open country where cattle production and horsemanship remain central to everyday life.

Unlike the romanticized image often associated with the West, ranching here is defined by responsibility. The work changes with the seasons, but the commitment to the cattle never does.

For a photographer, that reality is far more compelling than anything that could be staged.

Riding Health and Moving Cattle Across Summer Pastures

Summer on the ranch means long days in the saddle.

Cowboys ride through the herd checking cattle, looking for animals that need attention and making sure everything is where it should be. Known simply as "riding health," it is one of the most important jobs on a working ranch.

The work often involves gathering and moving cattle to fresh pasture, covering miles of country on horseback and relying on generations of accumulated knowledge. There are no shortcuts. Just horses, cattle, and people with a deep knowledge of the complicated land they work.

Many of the photographs from my June visit show these moments—the dust, the movement, and the quiet conversations that happen between cowboys who have spent years working together.

Checking cattle means covering miles of summer pasture on horseback.

Cattle cross a stock pond on their way through summer pasture.

The herd grazes through summer pasture as a cowboy checks cattle from horseback.

Riders watch the herd as cattle gather around a stock pond.

Calving Season and the Realities of Ranch Life

Winter brings some of the most rewarding and demanding work of the year.

Calving season means long days and interrupted nights as cowboys and ranch crews monitor cows and newborn calves. Most births happen naturally, but ranch life doesn't always unfold according to plan.

During one visit, I documented manual extractions performed to save both cows and calves when complications arose. These are not easy moments to witness, but they are part of the responsibility that comes with caring for livestock.

They reveal something important about ranching. Behind every healthy calf is a tremendous amount of labor, experience, and commitment.

The photographs made during calving season tell a story that extends far beyond romantic ideas of the American West. They show the realities that sustain it.

An unhealthy calf is loaded onto a ranch truck during calving season.

A cowboy carries a newborn calf back to the herd during calving season at Silver Spur Ranch.

The herd gathers nearby as a cowboy checks a newborn calf.

Winter at Silver Spur Ranch

December brings a different rhythm.

Snow, wind, and cold temperatures change the landscape, but the work continues. Horses still need to be saddled. Cattle still need to be checked. Equipment still needs attention.

Winter strips away distractions. What remains is a landscape defined by resilience and routine.

Some of my favorite photographs from Silver Spur Ranch were made during these colder months. The muted colors, the steam rising from horses, and the quiet atmosphere reveal another side of ranch life that often goes unseen.

Saddling a horse is the first task on a cold winter morning at Silver Spur Ranch.

Morning fog settles over the ranch as another day begins.

Frost-covered pasture stretches ahead as cattle are checked from horseback.

Bottle-feeding gives a newborn calf the extra care it needs during calving season at Silver Spur Ranch.

Opening pasture gates is part of moving cattle across the ranch.

Cattle move across a snow-covered pasture as riders follow from a distance.

A coyote hangs on a fence line during winter.

Photographing Authentic Cowboy Culture on Working Ranches

Over the last several years, I've had the privilege of documenting working ranches throughout Colorado, Texas, Arizona, Nebraska, Montana, Wyoming, and Nevada.

What connects them all is authenticity.

The men and women in these photographs are not models. They are ranchers, cowboys, and families whose lives revolve around caring for livestock and preserving traditions that have been passed from one generation to the next.

Silver Spur Ranch represents one chapter in a much larger story—one that continues to unfold across the American West.

Cowboys work a calf while their horses wait nearby.

The herd gathers near a stock pond as cattle are moved across pasture.

Travel between pastures is part of the daily routine.

Summer work continues from horseback across open country.

Related Cowboy Photography Stories

Other ranches and cowboy traditions featured on this website include:

• Diamond A Ranch in Arizona

• Haythorn Ranch in Nebraska

• Nevada Buckaroos and the traditions of the Great Basin

• The 6666 Ranch in Texas

• Ranching and cowboy culture across the American West

Together, these stories form an ongoing body of work documenting authentic cowboy life and the people who continue to keep those traditions alive.

Summer brings flies along with long days on the range, making herd health an ongoing part of ranch work.

Fine Art Prints and Commercial Licensing

Photographs from Silver Spur Ranch and other working ranches are available as fine art prints for collectors, interior designers, and Western enthusiasts.

Images are also available for editorial and commercial licensing for brands, publications, and organizations seeking authentic photography of ranching and cowboy culture.

For print inquiries, licensing, or assignment work, please get in touch.

The herd moves steadily across summer pasture under the guidance of a cowboy on horseback.

Riding health across open pasture is part of the daily routine.

A quiet moment between chores during calving season.

A herd of cattle moves through dense morning fog.

Supplies are gathered from the back of a ranch truck before heading out for the day's work.

Ranch tools wait on the tailgate before the day's work begins.

Cowboys pause on horseback before riding on.

Winter fence repairs keep the ranch ready for another season at Silver Spur Ranch.

Magnum Feedyard - Colorado

Inside a Cattle Feedyard: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at Magnum Feedyard

Most people will never step inside a working cattle feedyard.

They'll drive past one on a highway, catch a glimpse of thousands of cattle in the distance, and continue on their way. For many, it's simply another stop somewhere along the beef supply chain. But beyond the fences is an operation that begins long before sunrise and depends on an entire team of people whose work is rarely seen.

Earlier this year, I had the opportunity to photograph Magnum Feedyard near Wiggins, Colorado while on assignment for Mad Agriculture Magazine. Established in 1994, Magnum has grown from a modest feedyard into one of Colorado's largest feeding operations, caring for approximately 35,000 head of cattle while serving ranchers and cattle owners from across the region.

What surprised me most wasn't the scale. It was how much of the work still happens horseback and the care given to all of the cattle that go through the yard.

The first riders are already making their way through the yard before daylight.

Ready for another morning at Magnum Feedyard.

Before Sunrise

Long before daylight reaches the eastern plains, the day is already underway.

Horse trailers pull into the yard.

Coffee is poured.

Saddles are lifted from racks worn smooth by years of use.

Boots that have seen countless miles step onto concrete before finding dirt only minutes later.

Before sunrise, cattle move through the alleys under the watch of the morning crew.

The day's work begins long before daylight reaches the plains.

The Cowboys of the Feedyard

One of the biggest misconceptions about feedyards is that they're entirely mechanical.

The feed trucks, mills and equipment are certainly impressive, but they don't replace experienced horsemen, because they know the correct way to work and care for cattle, is horseback.

Every morning, pen riders move quietly through thousands of cattle, looking for subtle changes that most people would never notice. A single animal that hangs back, walks differently or doesn't come to the feed bunk may need additional attention. Catching those signs early is an important part of keeping cattle healthy.

Watching these riders work, it became clear that this wasn't simply transportation. The horse remains one of the most effective tools on the operation.

Morning rounds begin on horseback as cattle settle into the day.

Horses are readied before the morning work begins.

Horseback remains one of the most effective ways to work cattle through the yard.

A Landscape Built for Cattle

At sunrise the scale of the yard begins to reveal itself.

Pens stretch toward the horizon.

Dust catches the morning light.

Steam rises from feed as trucks begin their routes.

The operation sits in Morgan County, one of Colorado's most productive agricultural regions, where nearby farms produce much of the corn and alfalfa that help feed cattle throughout the year. Magnum's location on Colorado's Eastern Plains provides ready access to feed resources while taking advantage of the region's dry climate, conditions well suited to cattle feeding.

Despite the size, there is an unexpected rhythm to the morning.

Nothing feels hurried.

Everyone simply knows where they need to be.

Morning light reaches the cattle as another day begins at Magnum Feedyard.

Looking across the feedyard as the morning settles into its daily rhythm.

Sunrise filters across the pens as thousands of cattle begin the day.

Feeding Thousands of Animals

One of the most fascinating parts of the operation happens behind the scenes.

Large piles of corn, silage and other ingredients are blended into carefully formulated rations before being loaded into feed trucks that make their rounds throughout the yard.

Every ration is designed to meet the nutritional needs of the cattle at different stages of finishing, and consistency matters. Feed delivery, timing and animal observation all work together.

It's an enormous logistical operation, yet much of it unfolds with remarkable precision.

Dust rises as cattle move through the pens in the early morning light.

Feed ingredients begin their journey through the mill before the trucks head out.

Feed trucks are loaded before making their rounds through the yard.

Details That Tell the Story

Some of my favorite photographs from the assignment weren't made outside.

They were inside the barns and break rooms.

A pair of worn boots.

Cowboy hats hanging above lockers.

Well-used saddles.

Quiet portraits made before the day began.

These small details say as much about the place as the sweeping views across thousands of cattle.

They're reminders that, despite the size of the operation, everything ultimately depends on people showing up every morning to do demanding work with care and consistency.

A quiet moment inside the barn before heading out for the day.

Cowboy hats and well-worn boots wait above the lockers until the next shift begins.

Years of work are visible in a well-worn cowboy boot and spur.

Everyday work gear hangs ready for another morning in the feedyard.

Looking Beyond the Fence

Feedyards are often discussed from a distance.

Sometimes they're reduced to headlines, assumptions or debates.

Standing inside one is different.

You see the riders leaving before dawn.

You watch cattle quietly follow horses through the alleys.

You notice the attention paid to individual animals, the choreography of feeding, and the thousands of small decisions that keep an operation running.

Whether someone arrives with a background in agriculture or simply a curiosity about where their food comes from, spending time inside a working feedyard offers a perspective that's difficult to gain from the outside.

For me, it was an opportunity to document a place that most people will never see—and the people whose work begins long before the rest of us are awake.

Horse and rider pause between morning tasks.

Some moments require getting off the horse.

Portrait of a pen rider whose work begins long before most people are awake.

Part Of A Larger Story

For the last 6+ years I’ve been photographing working cowboys on historic ranches across the American West. And while doesn’t quite fit into that role, it’s still part of the entire process required to keep the world fed with beef. So I’m grateful to have seen it first hand and to share the work with you in hopes that you’ll see how humane these operations are - the opposite of what most news headlines will have you believe.

View the full cowboy photography gallery

View fine art prints from the cowboy series

Horse and rider wait together before heading into the yard.

Portrait of two cowboys and their horses in the barn at the Magnum Feedyard

Summer 2026 Art Festivals and Exhibitions

Western Art Festivals - Summer 2026

Most photographs spend their lives on screens.

They are viewed quickly, often while waiting in line at the store or sitting at a traffic light, then replaced by the next image without much thought at all. Prints are different. They ask people to slow down.

This summer I'll be exhibiting a selection of photographs from Calves to the Fire, my long-term project documenting working ranches and cowboy culture across the American West. The photographs have been made over the last 6 years while spending time on historic ranches in Nevada, Arizona, Texas, Montana, Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming, Oregon, and beyond.

If you're attending any of these events, I hope you'll stop by and spend some time with the work.

Dust hangs around the horses as two cowboys work through the herd, a direct scene from the working West.

Cherry Creek Arts Festival

The summer begins with the Cherry Creek Arts Festival in Denver, one of the country's premier outdoor art events.

I'll be exhibiting large statement pieces along with smaller framed photographs from Calves to the Fire. These authentic photogaphs were made while documenting cowboys and working ranch families whose traditions have been passed down through generations.

Art on the Rockies

Art on the Rockies provides a mountain setting that feels right at home with photographs rooted in the landscapes and traditions of the American West.

The work on display reflects years spent following the rhythms of ranch life, from gathering cattle and catching horses to the quieter moments that often say just as much about the people and places behind the work.

An old wooden corral sits below the Grand Teton Mountains, showing the Western landscapes that shape much of the work.

Jackson Hole Art Fair

Few places are more closely connected to the spirit of the American West, and I'm looking forward to bringing these photographs to Wyoming. Many of the prints on display represent years of returning to the same ranches and developing relationships with the families and cowboys who have trusted me with their stories.

Golden Fine Arts Festival

The final stop of the summer will be the Golden Fine Arts Festival, which has long attracted collectors and visitors from throughout Colorado's Front Range.

This exhibition will feature a collection of limited edition cowboy prints ranging from large statement pieces to smaller framed photographs. Whether someone is looking for a photograph for their home or simply enjoys stories from the American West, one of the best parts of exhibiting is the conversations that happen around the work.

Riders spread across open range beneath a wide sky, a scene rooted in the ranch culture behind the collection.

Why I Still Believe in Prints

A photograph changes when it becomes a print.

Details emerge. Scale matters. The textures and tones become easier to appreciate. More importantly, the stories behind the photographs become easier to understand.

After fifteen years of working on this project, one of the most rewarding parts has been seeing people connect with the images in person. Exhibiting at art festivals remains one of the few opportunities to share that experience face to face.

I hope to see you somewhere along the way this summer.

Details of worn leather, cowboy books, spurs, and cattle in the distance show the kind of working ranch scenes at the center of Calves to the Fire.

Collecting Cowboy Photography Prints

Limited edition prints from Calves to the Fire are available throughout the year. The collection includes photographs of branding crews, buckaroos, ranch landscapes, and the traditions that continue to shape the American West.

• View the limited edition cowboy prints

A large framed print brings a scene from the American West into a home setting, similar to the work on display at this summer’s art festivals.

Related Cowboy Photography Projects and Stories

Cowboy Photographer

View the full cowboy photography gallery

Related Stories

• Cowboy Prints Featured on Yellowstone and Dutton Ranch

• Buckaroos of Nevada

• Returning to Arizona's Diamond A Ranch

• The Corrals Series

Exhibitions and Inquiries

For questions about available prints, exhibitions, or commissions, please get in touch through the contact page.

A cowgirl works through cattle and dust, reflecting the daily ranch life documented across Calves to the Fire.

Artwork featured on the set of Dutton Ranch

Cowboy Photography Featured on the Set of Dutton Ranch

Recently, one of my cowboy photography prints appeared on the set of Dutton Ranch, the latest series set within the world of the modern American West.

It wasn't the first time my work has found its way onto a television set. Previously, four of my photographs were used on the set of Yellowstone, where they appeared as part of the visual landscape of one of the most successful Western dramas in recent memory.

As a photographer who has spent years documenting working ranches, cowboys, and ranching culture throughout the American West, those placements feel particularly meaningful. The photographs weren't created for television. They were made while documenting real people, real ranches, and a way of life that continues to shape the region today.

Seeing those images incorporated into productions that have helped reignite public interest in the American West is a reminder that authentic Western imagery still resonates with audiences far beyond ranch country.

Like many photographers, I've had images published in magazines, licensed for commercial campaigns, and exhibited in galleries. Seeing a photograph become part of a television production is a different experience altogether. Rather than serving as the subject of a story, the image becomes part of the environment itself—helping establish a sense of place, history, and authenticity within the world being portrayed on screen.

Two riders pause on a canyon ledge, showing the kind of real Western imagery that gives the cowboy photography project its sense of place.

The Importance of Authentic Western Imagery

The popularity of Western television and film has created renewed interest in the people, places, and traditions that continue to define ranching culture throughout the American West.

Audiences are increasingly drawn to stories that feel authentic. Whether it's a working ranch in Texas, a historic cattle operation in Nevada, or a multi-generational ranching family in Nebraska, viewers can recognize the difference between imagery that is staged and imagery that reflects lived experience.

Production designers and set decorators understand this better than anyone.

Every object that appears on screen helps establish the identity of a character, a family, or a place. The artwork hanging on a wall becomes part of that visual storytelling.

When a production chooses photography from real ranches and real working cowboys, it helps create a more believable world.

Photographing the Modern American West

The photographs featured on the set is part of an ongoing documentary project focused on cowboy culture and ranching communities throughout the American West.

Over the past several years, I've traveled countless miles documenting historic ranches, branding crews, horse wranglers, ranch families, saddle makers, artists, and working cowboys whose lives remain deeply connected to the land.

The goal has never been to recreate a romanticized version of the West.

Instead, the project focuses on the people who continue to live it every day.

The ranches may differ in size and geography, but many share the same values: hard work, stewardship, resilience, and a strong connection to tradition.

Those qualities continue to resonate far beyond ranch country.

Why Western Art Matters in Interior Spaces

One of the things I enjoy most about creating fine art prints is seeing where they ultimately end up.

Some are installed in private homes.

Others find their way into ranch headquarters, lodges, hospitality projects, corporate offices, and Western-inspired interiors.

A television set adds another chapter to that story.

In each case, the photograph becomes more than an image on a wall. It contributes to the atmosphere of a space and helps tell a larger story about the people who inhabit it.

The best Western artwork doesn't simply depict the West—it reflects the character, history, and culture behind it.

Rob Hammer’s cowboy photography print appears on the set of Dutton Ranch as part of the room’s Western set decor.

From Working Ranches to Television Screens

What makes this placement especially meaningful is that the photograph originated in the same world the series seeks to portray.

The image wasn't made on a movie set.

It wasn't created during a commercial production.

It was made while documenting real people and real ranching communities across the American West.

That authenticity has become one of the defining themes of the project, and it's gratifying to see those photographs continue to find new audiences through publications, exhibitions, private collections, and now television.

Cowboy Photography Prints from the American West

Many of the photographs from this ongoing project are available as museum-quality limited edition prints.

Collectors, ranch owners, designers, and hospitality clients have incorporated the work into homes, offices, lodges, and Western-inspired interiors throughout the country.

Each photograph is rooted in real places and real experiences, offering a contemporary look at ranching culture and life in the American West.

Explore More from the Cowboy Project

The image featured on the set of Dutton Ranch represents one photograph from a much larger body of work documenting cowboy culture across the American West.

Additional stories from the project include historic ranches, working cowboys, ranch families, Western artists, saddle makers, and the landscapes that continue to shape the region.

Together, they form an ongoing visual record of a culture that remains both enduring and relevant in the modern world.

While trends come and go, the stories of the American West continue to resonate. Seeing one of these photographs become part of a television production is a reminder that authentic Western imagery still holds a powerful place in the cultural imagination.

A horse herd gathers in open ranch country, reflecting the working landscapes and ranch culture behind Rob Hammer’s Western photography.

Daily Mail Features Cowboy Photography Project

The Enduring Appeal of the American Cowboy

Several years ago, a selection of photographs from my ongoing cowboy series was featured by the Daily Mail, one of the largest news publications in the world. The article introduced millions of readers to images made on working ranches across the American West—photographs of branding crews, ranch families, horse wranglers, and cowboys whose lives remain closely tied to the land.

What struck me most about the feature wasn't the size of the audience. It was the realization that people from all over the world continue to be fascinated by the American cowboy.

In an age dominated by technology, social media, and constant connectivity, there is still something compelling about a way of life built around livestock, weather, horses, and hard physical work. The cowboy remains one of the most recognizable figures in American culture, but the reality of modern ranching is often very different from the version portrayed in movies and television.

For the last several years, I’ve had the honor of documenting that reality.

Portraits like this keep the focus on the real people behind the cowboy photography project.

Details from the project show the tools, labor, and traditions that remain part of working ranch culture.

Beyond the Hollywood Cowboy

The American West has produced no shortage of myths. Popular culture has given us gunfighters, outlaws, and dramatic showdowns, but the people I've photographed spend their days doing something far less glamorous and far more important.

They mend fences.

They raise cattle.

They care for horses.

They watch the weather.

They work long days in conditions that can shift from scorching heat to blowing snow.

The photographs in this project were not staged. There were no actors, no wardrobe stylists, and no manufactured moments. Every image was made while documenting real people engaged in the work that sustains ranches throughout the West.

That authenticity is what drew me to the subject in the first place.

Open land, changing weather, livestock, and camp life all appear throughout the cowboy photography project.

Dust, movement, and horse work are part of everyday ranch life across the American West.

Photographing Working Ranches Across the American West

The project has taken me across thousands of miles and some of the most historic ranching country in North America.

From the legendary 6666 Ranch in Texas to multi-generational family operations in Nebraska, and other iconic ranches in Arizona, Montana, and Oregon, I've spent time with people whose families have often worked the same land for generations.

I've photographed branding days where hundreds of calves move through the branding pen in a matter of hours. I've ridden horseback before sunrise, stood in dust-filled corrals, and watched crews work together with a level of efficiency that only comes from a lifetime of experience.

These ranches differ in size, geography, and history, but they share a common thread: a commitment to preserving a way of life that continues to play an important role in the American West.

The work is demanding, but it is also deeply rooted in tradition, responsibility, and community.

Working ranch photography from the project shows the daily movement of cattle across open country in the American West.

Cowboys work together during a branding, one of the long-standing traditions documented throughout the project.

Why the Cowboy Still Matters

The enduring appeal of the cowboy isn’t about the hat, the boots, or the horse.

It's about values.

Self-reliance.

Resilience.

Stewardship.

Responsibility.

The people I've met while making this project are not interested in becoming symbols or cultural icons. Most are simply focused on the work that needs to be done each day.

Yet those values continue to resonate with people far beyond ranching communities.

Perhaps that is why stories about cowboys continue to capture attention around the world. They represent a connection to something tangible and enduring in a culture that often feels increasingly disconnected from the physical world.

The fascination isn't nostalgia for the past.

It's admiration for people who continue to live with purpose, skill, and a strong sense of responsibility to the land and animals in their care.

Images like this show the physical reality of ranch work and the enduring relationship between cowboys, horses, and the land.

Real ranch work remains at the center of the cowboy photography project, from horseback work to dust, cattle, and movement.

The Daily Mail Feature

When the Daily Mail published a selection of photographs from the project, readers from around the world were introduced to scenes from modern ranch life.

The feature highlighted working cowboys, branding crews, and ranch families whose stories rarely make headlines but whose work remains essential to the agricultural landscape of the American West.

For me, the article served as a reminder that authentic stories still matter. Despite the differences between urban and rural life, people remain curious about how others live and work. The response to the photographs demonstrated that genuine documentary imagery continues to connect with audiences regardless of geography.

A quiet moment between work shows another side of contemporary cowboy culture in the American West.

Cowboy Photography Prints and Western Wall Art

Many of the photographs from this project are available as museum-quality limited edition prints.

Collectors, ranch owners, interior designers, and hospitality clients have incorporated the work into homes, offices, lodges, and Western-inspired spaces throughout the country.

Printed on archival materials and produced to museum standards, these photographs are intended to preserve a visual record of contemporary ranch life while honoring the people who make it possible.

View the cowboy print collection

Horseback work remains one of the defining parts of ranching tradition in the American West.

Authentic ranch work often includes the practical details that rarely appear in popular portrayals of cowboy culture.

Explore More from the Cowboy Project

The Daily Mail feature represents only a small portion of a much larger body of work.

Additional stories from the project include photographs from historic ranches, profiles of working cowboys, ranching families, saddle makers, boot makers, and artists whose lives remain connected to the culture of the American West.

Together, these stories form an ongoing effort to document a way of life that continues to evolve while remaining firmly rooted in tradition.

The American cowboy may be one of the most recognizable figures in the world, but behind the myth are real people doing real work. Those are the stories that continue to draw me back to the ranches, year after year.

View the full cowboy photography gallery

Contact me directly to inquire about editorial and commercial licensing - rob@robhammerphotography.com

Scenes like this reflect the scale, teamwork, and tradition that continue to define contemporary cowboy culture.

Cowboys push cattle move through the pens, showing the steady coordination behind everyday ranch work.

Photographs from the project show the people, horses, and open landscapes that continue to define the American cowboy.

Photographing Real Veterans for a Brand Campaign

Authenticity Matters: Photographing Real Veterans for a Brand Campaign

In an era when many advertising campaigns rely on actors, carefully constructed sets, and highly controlled environments, authenticity has become one of the most valuable assets a brand can have.

People are remarkably good at recognizing when something feels genuine—and when it doesn't.

That idea was at the center of a recent assignment I photographed for Twisted X. The campaign celebrated America's upcoming 250th anniversary and a partnership with the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW). Rather than building a set or hiring actors to portray veterans, the decision was made to photograph real veterans in a real VFW hall.

For me, that choice made all the difference.

Twisted X shoes with American flag details are photographed inside the VFW hall used for the campaign.

Veterans talk near the mosaic wall inside the VFW hall during the brand campaign.

A personal moment inside the VFW hall reflects the real relationships and community surrounding the campaign.

A veteran sits for a close portrait in warm directional light during the campaign.

Why Authenticity Matters in Brand Photography

Brands often talk about authenticity, but creating images that genuinely feel authentic is more difficult than it sounds.

The strongest photographs rarely come from trying to manufacture reality. They come from finding people who have a genuine connection to the story being told and allowing that connection to come through naturally.

Audiences can sense the difference.

Whether the subject is a cowboy, a fly fishing guide, a tradesperson, or a military veteran, real experience brings a depth that is difficult to replicate.

The best brand photography doesn't simply show people. It communicates something about who they are.

A wider view of the VFW hall shows the real community setting behind the veterans brand campaign.

Inside the VFW hall, veterans gather at a table with an American flag hanging behind them.

Twisted X shoes appear in a low-angle detail from inside the VFW hall during the campaign.

The VFW hall gives the campaign a real setting, with veterans, guests, portraits, and memorabilia filling the room.

A close detail of Twisted X boots places the product naturally within the VFW hall setting.

Photographing Real Veterans

For this campaign, the subjects were not actors hired to play a role.

They were veterans whose lives and experiences gave genuine meaning to the project.

The assignment took place inside a VFW hall filled with the photographs, memorabilia, and history that naturally accumulate in places where veterans gather and maintain connections with their communities and one another.

Nothing about the environment needed to be manufactured.

The location already contained the character and authenticity that the campaign required.

Instead of directing subjects to act like veterans, the focus could remain on creating honest portraits and moments that reflected who they actually were.

That authenticity became one of the defining strengths of the imagery.

Inside the VFW hall, people gather at tables while the campaign takes place in a real community setting.

A group gathers for a photo inside the VFW hall during the veterans brand campaign.

Bingo cards, drinks, and small details from the table show the everyday setting inside the VFW hall.

A veteran wearing a Desert Storm Veteran cap sits in warm indoor light during the Twisted X campaign.

Beneath a wooden chair, a Twisted X shoe appears naturally within the everyday setting of the VFW hall.

Real Places Tell Better Stories

The same principle applies to locations.

Many productions spend significant resources trying to recreate environments that already exist.

For this assignment, there was no need.

The VFW hall provided a setting filled with visual details that could never be convincingly reproduced on a soundstage. Photographs on the walls, flags, plaques, and decades of accumulated history all contributed to the atmosphere.

These elements weren't props.

They were part of the story.

Photographing in a real environment creates layers of meaning that help viewers connect with an image on a deeper level, even if they can't immediately identify why.

Seen through the front window, the VFW hall shows the real community setting behind the veterans campaign.

A close detail of boots beneath the table keeps the product connected to the real VFW hall setting.

Veterans and community members sit together inside the VFW hall during the brand photography campaign.

Twisted X boots are photographed on the tile floor inside the real setting of the veterans campaign.

Inside the VFW hall, a veteran gestures while talking with others at the table.

The Connection to My Larger Body of Work

One of the reasons this assignment felt so natural is that it followed the same approach I've used throughout much of my photography career.

Whether documenting real people at work, cowboys, barbershops in all 50 states, fly fisherman, or small-town American communities, I've always been drawn to people who have a genuine connection to their environment and way of life.

The goal is never to create a version of authenticity.

The goal is to photograph authenticity itself.

Many of the strongest images from my long-term cowboy project were made because real people allowed me access to their lives and work. The same principle applied here.

The veterans didn't need to become characters.

They simply needed to be themselves.

Inside the VFW hall, the campaign moves through real conversations and everyday moments.

A veteran wearing a U.S. Army hat shares a laugh at the table inside the VFW hall.

People gather around the tables for bingo inside the VFW hall during the veterans brand campaign.

Veterans sit beneath rows of portraits inside the VFW hall, surrounded by the history of the post.

Why Real People Create Better Brand Stories

Brands are increasingly recognizing that audiences respond to honesty.

The most memorable campaigns often succeed because they are rooted in something real. Real experiences. Real places. Real people.

That doesn't mean every campaign must take a documentary approach. It does mean that authenticity should be considered at every stage of the creative process.

When brands build campaigns around people who genuinely embody the values they hope to communicate, the resulting imagery tends to feel more believable, more relatable, and ultimately more effective.

The camera can record a great deal of information.

What it records especially well is truth.

Veterans talk and laugh at the bar inside the VFW hall during the brand campaign.

A detail of boots and shoes beneath the bar keeps the product photography tied to the real VFW hall setting.

The VFW hall provides the real setting for the veterans brand campaign, with portraits and memorabilia visible throughout the room.

Authentic Photography for Brands and Agencies

Assignments like this are a reminder that great brand photography begins long before the shutter is pressed.

It starts with identifying authentic stories and the people best suited to tell them.

Whether working with ranchers, veterans, tradespeople, outdoor professionals, or other communities, my goal remains the same: create photographs that feel honest, grounded, and connected to real experience.

The strongest stories rarely need to be invented.

They are already there, waiting to be documented.

Additional Commercial Photography Projects

This campaign is one example of a broader body of commercial and documentary work focused on authentic people and authentic places.

From working ranches and Western brands to outdoor, agricultural, and lifestyle assignments, these projects share a common philosophy: real stories create stronger photographs.

Explore additional commercial photography projects, cowboy culture stories, and documentary work from across the American West and beyond.

Outside the VFW hall, a veteran sits on a motorcycle with Twisted X boots visible in the frame.

Twisted X boots are photographed beside a motorcycle outside the VFW hall, keeping the product tied to the real campaign setting.

Outside the VFW hall, a veteran stands beside his motorcycle beneath the American flag and POW/MIA flag.

Inside a Nevada Bull Sale

Inside a Nevada Bull Sale: Ranchers, Cattle, and Cowboy Culture

When most people think about cowboy culture, they picture horses, branding crews, and vast landscapes stretching toward the horizon. Those things certainly exist, but they are only part of the story.

The ranching industry is built on countless events, decisions, and relationships that happen away from the spotlight. One of those places is the bull sale.

These photographs were made at a bull sale in Gardnerville, Nevada, where ranchers from across the region gathered to evaluate cattle, reconnect with friends and neighbors, and make decisions that would influence their operations for years to come.

For an outsider, it might appear to be a simple livestock auction. In reality, it offered a fascinating glimpse into the people, traditions, and business of ranching in the American West.

An I Love Beef sticker sits on the back of a truck at the Nevada bull sale.

A rancher stands beside the cattle pens as numbered bulls move through the sale grounds in Gardnerville, Nevada.

More Than a Livestock Auction

A bull sale serves an important role within the cattle industry.

Ranchers attend to evaluate genetics, improve their herds, and invest in the future of their operations. The bulls that change hands during a single sale may influence cattle programs for years, making these events far more significant than a typical auction.

Yet what interested me most wasn't the cattle.

It was the people.

The sale brought together ranchers, cowboys, families, and livestock producers from across Nevada and neighboring states. Long before the first bid was placed, conversations were already happening in the aisles, around the cattle pens, and over a hot lunch.

The event felt as much like a community gathering as it did a business transaction.

A rancher walks along the fence line beside black bulls at the Nevada bull sale.

A woman stands on the pen rail above the sale grounds during a bull sale in Nevada.

A sale number is marked on a black Angus bull during the Nevada bull sale.

Photographing the Ranching Community

One of the things that immediately stood out was the diversity of people in attendance.

Young ranchers walked the pens alongside older cattlemen who had spent decades in the industry. Multi-generational families studied livestock together. Friends who may not have seen one another since the previous sale stopped to catch up and exchange stories.

The atmosphere was relaxed but purposeful.

Everywhere I looked, there were moments that reflected the culture surrounding ranching in the American West. A quiet conversation between old friends. A rancher carefully evaluating a bull. A weathered face shaped by years spent working outdoors.

These small moments often reveal more about a community than the headline events themselves.

Ranchers and sale attendees line up for lunch during a bull sale in Gardnerville, Nevada.

Ranchers and sale attendees gather for lunch during a bull sale in Nevada.

A Window Into Nevada Cowboy Culture

Nevada is home to some of the largest and most historic ranching operations in the country, yet much of that world remains invisible to people outside the agricultural community.

Events like this provide a rare opportunity to see the culture behind the imagery often associated with the American cowboy.

The hats, boots, and horses are certainly part of the story, but they are secondary to something deeper.

What stood out most was the sense of responsibility.

The people attending this sale were making decisions that affected their families, their businesses, and the future of their operations. Ranching remains a demanding profession that requires equal parts knowledge, adaptability, and persistence.

The photographs from this day reflect a community that continues to evolve while remaining deeply connected to its traditions.

An Angus sale catalog sits on a desk during the Nevada bull sale.

Ranchers watch from their seats as bull images are shown during the Nevada bull sale.

Ranchers and families fill the auction room during a bull sale in Gardnerville, Nevada.

One Day That Led to a Larger Project

It would be impossible to think that sitting in an empty firehouse parking lot in 2021, eating a sandwich on my tailgate would lead to 6+ year (ongoing) project about cowboys in the American West, but it did. The idea for Calves to the Fire had been swirling around in my head for quite some time prior to that day, but as an outsider to such an isolated and foreign culture, I just couldn’t figure my way in. Up until then I’d driven countless miles driving through Western states, photographing subjects adjacent to true cowboy culture, but nothing that led anywhere or meant anything.

Long story short, I’m sitting in the firehouse parking lot, eating lunch out of the cooler when a big pick-up barrels in along side me and the window goes down. There are two guys inside, open beers in the console, and they waste no time asking “do you know where the bull sale is?” At the time I had no idea what a bull sale was. Still though, my knee jerk reaction was “I don’t, but it sounds fun. Can I go?” After a little back and forth they gave me enough info to find the place, so I show up and introduce myself to Gary Ward; owner of Ward Bull Sales. He warmly invited me in to what felt literally like another world. My head was spinning with fascination and curiosity while I did my best to blend into the background and make some photographs. After the event was over I headed back out to the truck where I was asked by a few local cowboys, “What are you doing?” It was hard to tell if the question came from genuine interest or if it was a get the hell out of here! Either way, I answered honestly, telling them how I was trying to start a photography project on cowboys. Apparently it was my lucky day, because one of them invited me to their branding the following month, and the rest is sorta history.

I’m a believer that putting yourself out into the universe in a kind and caring way will produce the results you desire. And after more than a year of trying to start this project, the answer finally came in the form of two drunk fellas in an F350. Had I just left it at “no, I don’t know where the bull sale is”, then who knows where I’d be today? Instead, it’s an honor to say the cowboy who invited me to his branding is someone I’m proud to still call a friend 6 years later.

An auctioneer calls bids as ranchers follow the sale from their seats.

Ranchers and families watch the auction during a bull sale in Gardnerville, Nevada.

A rancher reviews the sale catalog during the Nevada bull auction.

Ranchers sit with sale catalogs while following the Nevada bull auction.

Exploring the Cowboy Project

These photographs represent one chapter in an ongoing body of work focused on ranching and cowboy culture throughout the American West.

Additional stories from the project include historic ranches, working cowboys, western artists, saddle makers, and the landscapes that continue to define the region.

Together, they form a broader portrait of a culture that is often misunderstood, frequently romanticized, and very much alive.

While the images of cowboys on horseback may capture the imagination, places like this Nevada bull sale help tell the rest of the story.

View the full cowboy photography gallery

View the cowboy print collection

An auctioneer calls bids from the floor as the bull sale continues in Nevada.

A young boy in a cowboy hat looks through the window during a bull sale in Nevada.

A young boy sits on the fence near the cattle pens during a Nevada bull sale.