OT- Strange old photo of three cow boys from Kansas?

Terry Murbach · Post by **Terry Murbach** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 11:02 am

MY OH MY, THAT IS INDEED STRANGE. BUT I'LL ALSO MAKE A SMALL SIDE WAGER IT IS A PHOTO OF THREE REAL COWBOYS WHO WENT TO TOWN IN THEIR SUNDAY-GO-TO-MEETING CLOTHES TO HAVE THEIR PICTURE TAKEN FOR ALL TO SEE BACK HOME. OR MAYBE THEY MADE IT INTO TOWN, BOUGHT ALL NEW CLOTHES FOR THE SAME PURPOSE, AND HAD THE PICTURE TAKEN.

kimwcook · Post by **kimwcook** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 11:24 am

I don't know what the wager is, but I'll take a bit of that. There's nothing about that picture that fits in my opinion. Looks like three young dudes dressing up for a cowboy photo.

Leverluver · Post by **Leverluver** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 11:41 am

Nitty Gritty Dirt Band ???

Post by **Hobie** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 11:49 am

A S&W DA revolver, Winchester 1887 (or 1901) shotgun are neat but what is with the "Chief" belt?

I love your old photos, ALWAYS interesting!

Nate Kiowa Jones · Post by **Nate Kiowa Jones** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 12:28 pm

Everything looks too new, to me. I'm gonna say all hat and no cattle.

86er · Post by **86er** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 12:40 pm

Thompson Photography at 1730 Broadway St has not been around more than 20 years. Could it be the same studio that the photo was taken at?

gamekeeper · Post by **gamekeeper** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 12:48 pm

Looks like the guy in the dark shirt has the shotgun shells but the "Chief" has the shotgun!

JB · Post by JB » Thu Mar 18, 2010 1:05 pm

It looks like an early version of the "All Male Review" dance troop.

Warhawk · Post by **Warhawk** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 1:34 pm

My wife is from Peabody, KS. I can't imagine Peabody ever having a photographer, but it must have. They are barely hanging onto the gas station there today.

SJPrice · Post by **SJPrice** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 1:40 pm

Hobie wrote:A S&W DA revolver, Winchester 1887 (or 1901) shotgun are neat but what is with the "Chief" belt?

I love your old photos, ALWAYS interesting!

That is easy, he was a sports fan...The "Kansas City Chiefs"

Post by **Ysabel Kid** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 1:47 pm

Early visitors from San Francisco?

Warhawk · Post by **Warhawk** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 1:58 pm

rangerider7 wrote:

Apparently Frederick Remington had a studio in Peabody, KS. Must have been a lot more to Peabody back in the late 1800's.

http://www.cartermuseum.org/remington-a ... l/timeline

Circa 1881

1883

Buck Elliott · Post by **Buck Elliott** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 2:07 pm

"Cowboys...?" I don't think so.

How many photos of REAL cowboys have you seen where the shirt front is unbuttoned to that extent?

An old friend of mine used to say, "a man's intelligence can be rated in inverse proportion to the number of buttons he leaves unfastened on his shirt..." Double that for cowboys

SJPrice · Post by **SJPrice** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 2:11 pm

Buck Elliott wrote:"Cowboys...?" I don't think so.

How many photos of REAL cowboys have you seen where the shirt front is unbuttoned to that extent?

An old friend of mine used to say, "a man's intelligence can be rated in inverse proportion to the number of buttons he leaves unfastened on his shirt..." Double that for cowboys

Good point Buck, by the way, how many buttons are unfastened under your bandana in your avatar?

Buck Elliott · Post by **Buck Elliott** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 2:22 pm

Borregos · Post by **Borregos** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 2:57 pm

Hope the guy in the middle does not sit down, that knife is going to do some real damage

Nath · Post by **Nath** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 3:21 pm

They look like brothers to me!

Nath.

Buck Elliott · Post by **Buck Elliott** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 3:25 pm

Or bearded sisters...???

rock-steady · Post by **rock-steady** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 3:32 pm

Them aint no cowboys. More like sheep wranglers come to town after a long winter on Brokeback Mountain.

Definately from Kansas, though.....

765x53 · Post by **765x53** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 3:38 pm

How many white men wore their hair that long in that day?

MrMurphy · Post by **MrMurphy** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 3:51 pm

Custer had long hair, till some Indian borrowed it.

Lots of Europeans had longer hair (in the early 1800s, some regiments required you to grow a mustache/beard/long hair dependent on tradition).

I'm thinking they're waiting for the fourth guy to come back so they can do their version of the "YMCA" on camera.......

Pathfinder09 · Post by **Pathfinder09** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 3:52 pm

It's the cover of the Three Dog Night reunion album.

The hair would look good on some indians lodge pole!

vancelw · Post by **vancelw** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 4:28 pm

MrMurphy wrote:Custer had long hair, till some Indian borrowed it.

Lots of Europeans had longer hair (in the early 1800s, some regiments required you to grow a mustache/beard/long hair dependent on tradition).

I'm thinking they're waiting for the fourth guy to come back so they can do their version of the "YMCA" on camera.......

Nope. Custer had short hair when he died. He had cut his hair and the Indians didn't know they were fighting Custer until after the battle was over. Even the Cheyenne accounts say that he was one of the last standing. The Cheyenne women were out mutilating the bodies of the soldiers and recognized Custer. He supposedly had a Cheyenne mistress back at Ft Scott, KS.

My first reaction is that cowboys didn't have long hair back then, but didn't several performers with Buffalo Bill's show have long hair?? The curly part is what gets my attention. They must have just had baths for their hair to be so clean.

Terry Murbach · Post by **Terry Murbach** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 4:40 pm

765x53 wrote:How many white men wore their hair that long in that day?

A LOT OF 'EM ACTUALLY !! IT WAS VERY COMMON. ALSO THAT PICTURE IS WELL PAST 99% OF INJUN TROUBLES I'D SPECULATE. I'M TELLING YOU BOYS, THOSE FELLOWS ARE THE REAL McCOY. I MEAN TO SAY WHO WOULD GO TO AN OUT-OF-THE WAY PLACE LIKE PEABODY KS FOR A BIG DEAL LIKE GETTING YOUR PICTURE TAKEN EXCEPT SOMEONE CLOSE TO THERE FOR ONE REASON, THEY ARE WORKING IN THE AREA. OTHERWISE THEY'D GO TO WHERE YOU THINK THEY'RE FROM, THE BIG CITY...NEWTON....WICHITA....EMPORIA....OR WHERE EVER.

zack coyote · Post by **zack coyote** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 4:49 pm

They look like an acting troup to me.

Marlin32 · Post by **Marlin32** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 5:31 pm

Yep, obviously Kansans.

Hawkeye2 · Post by **Hawkeye2** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 6:38 pm

My bet: it's all studio props including the hair!

Don McDowell · Post by **Don McDowell** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 6:50 pm

Just get a kick out of a bunch of critics, the closest they've been to a cow is the drive up window at Burger King, deciding what is or isn't an 1890's cowboy.

Like Terry said those are the real deal.

KSRtrd · Post by **KSRtrd** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 6:52 pm

No respect I tell ya, treating Kansas like it's a suburb of Austen.

FWiedner · Post by **FWiedner** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 7:51 pm

They might have been real farm boys who got cleaned up to get the picture taken, but those guns don't belong to 'em at all, and I've got doubts about the head-gear. No wear on the hats. Sweat stains, creases, crushes, brush marks, etc. They all three got new hats at the same time? Prolly not.

Gun Smith · Post by **Gun Smith** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 7:52 pm

All city slickers, no tans!

Don McDowell · Post by **Don McDowell** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 8:10 pm

Hmmm, new clothes

Well stuff fellers never heard of taking your crop(calf,corn, wool etc) to town, selling it and using the money to buy new clothes, supplies for the next year etc?

Some folks are just to far removed from how the folks that feed em live

FWiedner · Post by **FWiedner** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 8:19 pm

... and some others are full of bull squeezin's...

Don McDowell · Post by **Don McDowell** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 8:44 pm

And some are amply qualified to recognize bullsqueezins from their own experiences

Birdman · Post by **Birdman** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 8:59 pm

Who really knows, but I like the old photo's too.

gundownunder · Post by **gundownunder** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 9:40 pm

Brokeback mountain men for sure
The limp wristed fellow on the left is almost holding that revolver. Probably a good thing too, because if it went off the one in the middle wouldn't need a knife to make him squeal like a girl.

AJMD429 · Post by **AJMD429** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 9:43 pm

It looks strange to me the way the one on the left is holding the handgun; someone who uses a gun and is more comfortable with one, would hold it more by the handle, although hopefully with finger off the trigger. I vote city-kids with 'props', but then I've seen modern-day pics that are authentic and look fake, and fake ones that look authentic, so we'll likely never know for sure.

Keep the pics coming, though - they are always interesting.

rangerider7 · Post by **rangerider7** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 9:45 pm

I knew this one would bring on some conversation.

jdad · Post by **jdad** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 9:53 pm

rangerider7 wrote:I knew this one would bring on some conversation.

I get a big kick out of your photos. I know someday someone is going to recognize "family".

pokey · Post by **pokey** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 10:17 pm

Gun Smith wrote:All city slickers, no tans!

good call, that's the give away. anybody working outside even today
would have a "farmers tan", hands and face. add that to unfamiliar gun
handling, and all new duds, and possibly FALSE long hair, smells fishy.

been wrong once before though.

Don McDowell · Post by **Don McDowell** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 10:25 pm

So just exactly what makes you historical experts think that everybody would have a death grip on a handgun?
Hell most folks didn't even own one.

765x53 · Post by **765x53** » Thu Mar 18, 2010 10:31 pm

In western Missouri and eastern Kansas, Peabody means coal. I say, eastern European miners.

Buck Elliott · Post by **Buck Elliott** » Fri Mar 19, 2010 11:59 am

765x53 wrote:In western Missouri and eastern Kansas, Peabody means coal. I say, eastern European miners.

Welsh or Irish...

Mayhaps they got seperated from Oscar Wilde's traveling circus...???

(if there were ever young men who defined "fish out of water," it would be those three...)

Griff · Post by **Griff** » Fri Mar 19, 2010 1:01 pm

Photographer's props or brand new duds, it seems to me as it's possibly the former. I figure folk's nature ain't changed all that much, epsecially friends. If my two bestest pals & I went to town with a wad of cash, to either have our picture took so's we'd look like our idea of cowboys, or we were cowboy's, or even farm kids wantin' to look like cowboys and wantin' a souvenir picture taken with our new duds; I guarantee ya, that if one of us bought new boots or new chaps, the other two would want 'em also.

I strongly suspect that they're 3 farm kids wearin' the photographer's props to look like riders in one of the very popular wild west shows. Peabody, KS; them locals knew what cowboy were... and probably didn't like 'em much, would hardly wanna emulate 'em... but Wild West trick riders and performers... Yea Buddy!

Don McDowell · Post by **Don McDowell** » Fri Mar 19, 2010 2:54 pm

You mean a fish out a water like this one?

O.S.O.K. · Post by **O.S.O.K.** » Fri Mar 19, 2010 2:54 pm

Wow, I'm surprised ya'll missed this.

I'm thinking that's the photo that inspired the line "three gay cabelleros"

Buck Elliott · Post by **Buck Elliott** » Fri Mar 19, 2010 3:32 pm

Don McDowell wrote:You mean a fish out a water like this one?

Not quite.... Commodore Perry Owens had plenty of credentials to dress any way it pleased him...

Those boys are DUDES, pure and simple... They may work hard at whatever it is they do, but it sure ain't cowboyin'... (nor farmin' either, would be my guess...)

Don McDowell · Post by **Don McDowell** » Fri Mar 19, 2010 3:53 pm

Thing is tho we already knew CPO, we don't know who those kids are, and chances are they could be just as rough and tumble as he was.
Don't judge a man by the cut of his cloth. Those young fellers being in Peabody Ks at that time could be most anything from actors in a traveling wildwest show, to local tuffs, to like Griff said kids dressing like the guys the just saw with Carver and Cody's show,to Texas farmboys just finished a trail up to Abline, and stopped on their way home for a picture.
They even wrote a song about a Bronc twister that didn't look like he ought to be, but could ride the worst of em and won a good bit of money doing so.
Hell back in those days cowboys were from all over the place, Will James was a dairy farm kid from Ontario, Teddy Blue was a sodbuster's kid from Lincoln. The real deal wasn't always some office help in town someplace that ride their lil horsey's up and down the bar pit, and go to shoots with all sorts of sixguns and bowie knives stuck in their belt and callin each other pard, like we have nowdays.

B-lever · Post by **B-lever** » Fri Mar 19, 2010 4:04 pm

Might be a well-to-do family from overseas traveling around the the US. The 3 boys dressed up to amaze their friends at home.