WEBVTT - Who Were the First Cowboys? 0:00:01.920 --> 0:00:04.320 Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of I Heart Radio, 0:00:06.200 --> 0:00:10.720 Hey brain Stuff, Lauren Vogelbaum. Here, whether it's John Wayne 0:00:10.800 --> 0:00:14.239 or Little Nez, the cowboy holds a sacred place and 0:00:14.280 --> 0:00:17.919 the pantheon of American heroes. But the cowboy that we 0:00:18.040 --> 0:00:21.480 know didn't spring fully formed from the dust and tumbleweeds 0:00:21.480 --> 0:00:24.440 of the wild West. The original cowboy, in fact, had 0:00:24.480 --> 0:00:28.600 nothing to do with the wild West. Historically speaking, the 0:00:28.720 --> 0:00:32.800 whole cowboy image, the trusty horse, the open range, get along, 0:00:32.800 --> 0:00:36.040 little doggie, camp fires under starry nights, old town road, 0:00:36.159 --> 0:00:40.000 beans from a chuckwagon, yeehaw, cattle drives, branding, chaps, and 0:00:40.040 --> 0:00:44.120 spurs grew from roots a long way from the American West. 0:00:45.320 --> 0:00:50.280 It all began in Europe with three central elements man, cow, 0:00:50.520 --> 0:00:55.440 and horse. In Spain, for centuries, the horse was king. 0:00:56.240 --> 0:00:59.000 Richard W. Slatta writes in the introduction of his book 0:00:59.040 --> 0:01:01.960 Cowboys of the amir Beca's social history of cowboys in 0:01:02.000 --> 0:01:06.440 the Western Hemisphere. Quote the Spanish culture endowed horsemanship with 0:01:06.520 --> 0:01:10.960 high status. Official portraits of Spanish kings depicted them astride, pawing, 0:01:11.120 --> 0:01:15.760 rearing horses. The Spanish used their horses in a burgeoning 0:01:15.840 --> 0:01:19.920 livestock economy, which included cattle and sheep to complement farming 0:01:20.040 --> 0:01:23.640 in the fourteen hundreds, and when the Spanish made their 0:01:23.680 --> 0:01:26.040 voyages to the so called New World in the late 0:01:26.080 --> 0:01:30.640 fourteen hundreds, they took with them horses and cattle. Eventually, 0:01:30.720 --> 0:01:34.480 from Espaniola, the island that today houses the Dominican Republic, 0:01:34.520 --> 0:01:37.760 and Haiti, the men, the horses, and the cattle made 0:01:37.760 --> 0:01:41.040 their way to Florida and parts of what's now Mexico. 0:01:42.319 --> 0:01:44.920 The cattle multiplied, and the need for horsemen to track 0:01:44.959 --> 0:01:47.800 them down and keep them in line grew. Cows were 0:01:47.840 --> 0:01:50.880 needed then, more for their hides than their meat, So 0:01:51.120 --> 0:01:54.440 ranchers trained Native Americans who came up with all sorts 0:01:54.480 --> 0:01:58.680 of new cow handling techniques, and the vaccaro was born. 0:01:59.840 --> 0:02:02.560 The word comes from the Spanish word for cow, vacca, 0:02:03.080 --> 0:02:07.680 and the volcaro, sometimes pronounced baccarro, is the direct predecessor 0:02:07.760 --> 0:02:11.680 of the American cowboy. In Russell Friedman's book In the 0:02:11.800 --> 0:02:15.880 Days of the Vacaro, America's first true Cowboys, he explains 0:02:15.919 --> 0:02:18.920 that Vacarro's were herding cattle on the Mexican planes some 0:02:19.040 --> 0:02:22.760 five hundred years ago. They were poor laborers and not 0:02:22.840 --> 0:02:25.920 given much credit by the Spanish colonizers who employed them, 0:02:25.960 --> 0:02:30.680 but they invented the cowboy as we know it. Other 0:02:30.800 --> 0:02:35.240 cowboys proliferated through Central and South America. In Mexico there 0:02:35.280 --> 0:02:39.880 was also the chatto, usually the Vaciro's horsemen landowners. There 0:02:39.960 --> 0:02:43.480 was the Naro in Venezuela, the Waso in Chile, the 0:02:43.480 --> 0:02:46.600 gaut Show in Argentina and Uruguay. They can all trace 0:02:46.639 --> 0:02:50.840 their ancestors to the Va Caro, and America too, would 0:02:50.840 --> 0:02:53.880 soon have its own version of a horseman and cattle herder. 0:02:55.160 --> 0:02:58.919 As the Vicarro's learned to rope and ride and through lariats, 0:02:58.960 --> 0:03:01.600 as they modified their saddles to include a horn to 0:03:01.680 --> 0:03:05.280 anchor rope too, and as they introduced sun blocking hats 0:03:05.320 --> 0:03:09.120 and leg protecting chaps. They moved into what is now Texas, 0:03:09.960 --> 0:03:13.440 and their influence was felt even farther west. In eighteen 0:03:13.520 --> 0:03:16.720 thirty two, King Kamama the Third sent for some Vicarios 0:03:16.800 --> 0:03:20.000 to help with wild cattle in Hawaii. The Hawaiian cowboy 0:03:20.080 --> 0:03:25.240 became known as the Paniolo. Eventually, an American counterpart formed 0:03:25.280 --> 0:03:29.280 and spread throughout the West. Cowboys had other names cowhands, 0:03:29.360 --> 0:03:34.040 cow punchers, cow pokes, cattlemen, buckaroos, and drovers. We officially 0:03:34.080 --> 0:03:36.200 those who moved cattle from one place to another on 0:03:36.240 --> 0:03:40.920 a cattle drive. But the work was the same, long days, 0:03:41.240 --> 0:03:44.000 nights on the plains, a lot of dust, some danger, 0:03:44.600 --> 0:03:47.520 and when they weren't working the herds, they were branding cattle, 0:03:47.640 --> 0:03:51.320 fixing fences, caring for their horses, and performing other hard 0:03:51.400 --> 0:03:57.280 labor around ranches. They weren't necessarily gamblers and gunfighters like 0:03:57.440 --> 0:04:00.400 say wild Bill Hickock, or gun slinging law men like 0:04:00.480 --> 0:04:03.720 White Earth or his showy buddy Dot Holiday, or did 0:04:03.720 --> 0:04:07.200 I sharpshooters like Anti Oakley, or all out showmen like 0:04:07.280 --> 0:04:10.960 Buffalo Bill Cody. Though all of these legends have legit 0:04:11.040 --> 0:04:13.440 claims to a spot in the Wild West Hall of Fame, 0:04:14.080 --> 0:04:16.599 and in a way, all of those types have become 0:04:16.680 --> 0:04:22.640 known as cowboys. Slaughter wrote in the Cowboy Encyclopedia, the 0:04:22.680 --> 0:04:25.839 cowboy of the American West, a dashing figure in popular 0:04:25.880 --> 0:04:29.880 novels and films, was in reality a poorly paid laborer 0:04:29.920 --> 0:04:34.479 engaged in difficult, dirty, often monotonous work. The cowboys work 0:04:34.560 --> 0:04:37.120 year centered on two big events, the roundup and the 0:04:37.160 --> 0:04:40.479 long drive. Roundups were held in the spring, and often 0:04:40.560 --> 0:04:43.800 also in the fall. After cowboys had herded cattle to 0:04:43.839 --> 0:04:47.360 a central location, they branded newborn calves, castrated and de 0:04:47.520 --> 0:04:51.200 horned older animals, and in the spring chose the cattle 0:04:51.279 --> 0:04:54.960 to be taken to market. At one time, tens of 0:04:55.000 --> 0:04:58.600 thousands of cowboys worked ranches throughout the West. By the 0:04:58.680 --> 0:05:01.400 end of the American Civil War, an estimated quarter of 0:05:01.440 --> 0:05:05.839 those were black cowboys, many of them formerly enslaved. But 0:05:06.080 --> 0:05:09.640 the cowboys heydaid didn't last long. The invention of barbed 0:05:09.640 --> 0:05:12.359 wire in the late eighteen hundreds helped pen cattle in 0:05:12.839 --> 0:05:16.480 and the expansion of railroads made long cattle drives less necessary. 0:05:18.080 --> 0:05:22.440 So the white, well kempt gunslinger cowboy of Hollywood westerns 0:05:22.640 --> 0:05:27.159 isn't a particularly accurate image, but like the cowboy himself 0:05:27.560 --> 0:05:35.880 or herself, it is an enduring one. Today's episode was 0:05:35.920 --> 0:05:38.640 written by John Donovan and produced by Tyler Clang. For 0:05:38.720 --> 0:05:40.400 more on this and lots of other topics that are 0:05:40.440 --> 0:05:43.200 wanted dead or alive, visit how stuff works dot com. 0:05:43.279 --> 0:05:45.600 Brain Stuff is production of I Heart Radio. Four more 0:05:45.640 --> 0:05:48.160 podcasts from my heart Radio visit the iHeart Radio app, 0:05:48.240 --> 0:05:51.000 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,