Bill Pickett: Bulldogger

While blacks have played an important role—as explorers, scouts, Indian consorts, soldiers, cowboys, farmers—in the exploration, conquest, and settlement of the American West, they have received scant attention from the chroniclers of the pageant of western development.

Few of rodeo’s early heroes matched the achievements of the black cowboy Bill Pickett, and his story is recounted here for the first time in book form.

Pickett grew up in Texas in the 1880’s, the child of former slaves, to b...