FIRST HERD TO ABILENE
An H. H. Lomax Western, #5
by
by
PRESTON LEWIS
Genres: Historical Fiction / Western / Humor
Publisher: Wolfpack Publishing
Date of Publication: February 5, 2020
Number of Pages: 449
Scroll down for the giveaway!
HISTORICALLY SOUND AND HILARIOUSLY FUNNY! H.H. Lomax meets Wild Bill Hickok in Springfield, Missouri, and is responsible for Hickok’s legendary gunfight with Davis Tutt. Fearing Hickok will hold a grudge, Lomax escapes Springfield and agrees to promote Joseph G. McCoy’s dream of building Abilene, Kansas, into a cattle town, ultimately leading the first herd to Abilene from Texas.
Along the way, he encounters Indians, rabid skunks, flash floods, a stampede, and the animosities of some fellow cowboys trying to steal profits from the drive. Lomax is saved by the timely arrival of now U.S. Marshal Hickok, but Lomax uses counterfeit wanted posters to convince Hickok his assailants are wanted felons with rewards on their heads.
Lomax and Wild Bill go their separate ways until they run into each other a decade later in Deadwood, Dakota Territory, where Hickok vows to kill Lomax for getting him fired.
First Herd to Abilene is an entertaining mix of historical and hysterical fiction.
Preston Lewis is the Spur Award-winning author of thirty novels. In addition to his two Western Writers of America Spurs, he received the 2018 Will Rogers Gold Medallion for Western Humor for Bluster’s Last Stand, the fourth volume in his comic western series, The Memoirs of H. H. Lomax. Two other books in that series were Spur finalists. His comic western The Fleecing of Fort Griffin received the Elmer Kelton Award from the West Texas Historical Association for best creative work on the region.
║AMAZON AUTHOR PAGE║
1. The walkway outside the Chisholm Trail Heritage Center in Duncan, Oklahoma, represents the journey from South Texas to Kansas with medallions representing the start and the ending of the trail. An estimated five million head of cattle, thousands of cowboys and a handful of women made the trek up the Chisholm Trail and its successors between 1867 and 1887. The cattle drives helped establish the cowboy as the American folk hero.
2. The graves of Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane lay side by side in the Mount Moriah Cemetery in Deadwood, South Dakota. The relationship between Hickok and Martha Jane Canary has always been a bit murky in the history books. Some say Hickok did not care for her and, as a joke, some of his friends thought it would be fun to bury her by his side for eternity. Since her 1903 burial, Hickok and Canary have been linked not only by proximity but also by western novels and movies.
3. Perhaps the largest commemoration of the Chisholm Trail is called “Branding the Brazos” and features 25 bronze longhorns and three larger-than-life mounted cowboys in Indian Spring Park near downtown Waco, Texas. The $1.65 million installation, including this trail boss, was the work of Texas sculptor Robert Summers, who took eight years to finish the project, which has become Waco’s most photographed landmark since its completion in 2014.
4. The “Branding the Brazos” sculpture commemorating the Chisholm Trail at its Brazos River crossing in Waco, Texas, features three 14-foot-tall mounted riders—one white, one black and one Hispanic cowboy shown here. The American cattle industry had its roots in the Spanish settlement of what became Texas and many of the Hispanic conventions and traditions were carried on by the Anglo and African American Texans who followed.
5. Many fine museums document the history and legacy of the Chisholm Trail, including the Chisholm Trail Heritage Center in Duncan, Oklahoma. The “On the Chisholm Trail” sculpture by Oklahoma artist Paul Moore welcomes visitors to the Duncan center. Standing 15 feet tall and 35 feet across, the sculpture-and-relief bronze is a monument to the men and cattle that made the trek from Texas to the railheads in Kansas.
6. No one on a trail drive was more important than the cook with his chuck wagon. In First Herd to Abilene Charlie Bitters is not the best cook to ever ride the Chisholm Trail, hence the nickname of “Upchuck” behind his back. Even so, he is the only cook the Five D Ranch cowboys have so they have to make do with him from San Antonio to Abilene, Kansas. This diorama from the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City shows a typical chuck wagon scene.
7. Since First Herd to Abilene tells the parallel stories of the first trail drive to Abilene and protagonist H.H. Lomax’s strained relationship with famous gunfighter Wild Bill Hickok, these horns from a display at the Heritage Center of Dickinson County in Abilene are particularly appropriate for this photo album. The horns came from a steer Hickok shot and killed on the streets of Abilene after it stampeded and overturned a buggy, injuring a woman and child in 1871.
8. This chair—believed to be the one in which Wild Bill Hickok sat when he was killed in the original Saloon No. 10—is displayed over the front door of the rebuilt Saloon No. 10 at 657 Main Street, Deadwood, South Dakota. The original saloon on the opposite side of the street at 624 Main burned in 1879, three years after Hickok was shot by Jack McCall August 2, 1876. The poker draw of aces and eights in Hickok’s hand when he was killed has come to be known as the “dead man’s hand.”
9. Wild Bill Hickok killed Davis Tutt in a gunfight on the Springfield, Missouri, town square on July 21, 1865. The men stood 75 yards apart when they drew their revolvers and fired. Tutt missed, Hickok did not, striking his opponent in the heart. Tutt is buried in Springfield’s Maple Park Cemetery. Though such one-on-one showdowns on a town street were rare in the Old West, they became a staple of subsequent Hollywood westerns.
10. The end of the trail medallion at the Chisholm Trail Heritage Center represents the hardships encountered along the trail, including water crossings, lightning, hail, rustlers, and stampedes. U.S. Highway 81 through Oklahoma closely follows the route of the Chisholm Trail through El Reno, Duncan, Chickasha and Enid, all towns which evolved along the trail in subsequent years. Hundreds of western novels and dozens of movies have immortalized the trail drive era.
GIVEAWAY:
1ST PRIZE:
Signed Copies of First Herd to Abilene and Bluster's Last Stand
2ND PRIZE:
Signed Copy of First Herd to Abilene
Signed Copies of First Herd to Abilene and Bluster's Last Stand
2ND PRIZE:
Signed Copy of First Herd to Abilene
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