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Americanisms in The Day the Cowboys Quit

 

            
             The novel The Day the Cowboys Quit is about cowboys and the days of the old Texas cattle drives. The date in which this novel takes place is in 1883 in the Texas Panhandle. The cowboys had always been stereotyped as drinkers, and now, they refused to be stigmatized as drinkers and exploited by the wealthy cattle owners who have plenty of money, but don't even pay livable wages to the cowboys. Those very same wealthy ranchers want to take away the right for cowboys to own their own cattle because they feel that the cowboys can't be trusted. The ranchers believe that if the cowboys have the right to own their own cattle, it may lead to the cowboys steeling the rancher's cattle. So, in 1883, the new dictum is set: If you"re a cowboy, you can't own a cow. When the news of such legislation travel from wagon to wagon, the cowboys decide to rally and fight for their rights--they gather together and fight. The novel also boasts many Americanisms, which I will name a few of in the following paragraphs.
             The first Americanism that I located in this novel was that of Yankee ingenuity. In the novel, one of the cowboys has started owning his own cattle, and he needed a brand to brand his cattle so that they didn't get mixed up with all of the other cattle. Well, the owner of this new cattle group could not afford to buy his own brand so he borrowed another cowboy's brand and made a different shape out of it on his cattle. The brand that he borrowed was in the shape of a "W", so he burned it on the cattle once right side up, then flipped it and burned it as an upside down "W". This resulted in a 2-diamond pattern, so his new cattle brand was 2 diamonds. This is Yankee ingenuity because he him making the different symbol with the "W" was a temporary solution to an immediate .
             Ringo - 2.
             problem. .
             The second Americanism I found was land. It's obvious that there is a lot of land covered in this book because they are on a cattle drive.


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