Vaquero: Genesis of the Texas Cowboy

Vaquero: Genesis of the Texas Cowboy

Traveling Exhibit, Sept 1 - Oct 11

In the early 1970s, noted Texas historian Joe Frantz offered Bill Wittliff a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity—to visit a ranch in northern Mexico where the vaqueros, or cowboys, still worked cattle in traditional ways. Wittliff photographed the vaqueros as they went about daily chores that had changed little since the first Mexican cowherders learned to work cattle from a horse’s back. Wittliff captured a way of life that now exists only in memory and in the photographs included in this exhibition.

The exhibition features carbon prints that reveal the muscle, sweat and drama that went into roping a calf in thick brush or breaking a wild horse in the saddle.

Access to the exhibition is included with regular museum admission.

Pioneer Museum 

325 W. Main Street

Mon – Sat. 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.