Category: Misc.

Random Western-related stuff that I’ve found while researching movies or just happened to find.

The Cowboys (Laramie Weekly Sentinel, August 20, 1881)

The trigger-happy cowboy, honorable yet ill-tempered, jovial and murderous at the same time, is no modern invention. Even people of the contemporary Wild West revered and feared wild tales of roughnecked gunslingers, as this 1881 Wyoming newspaper article demonstrates. I love digging through old newspapers - they are neat timecapsules of an era long gone … Continue reading The Cowboys (Laramie Weekly Sentinel, August 20, 1881) →

A better mousetrap – Texan style

J.A. Williams design for a better mousetrap. Patented on December 26th 1882.

The classic spring-loaded moustrap design, first patented in 1884 by one William C. Hooker, is basically the one we still use today. But two years earlier, one Jason Alexander Williams of Fredonia, Texas had a different kind of spring-loaded design in mind... one that heavily relied on the use of a .50 caliber bullet. In … Continue reading A better mousetrap – Texan style →